


A Kinder Man

by Smallheathen



Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Betrayal, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Esme and Ada ship it, Eventual Romance, Explicit Language, F/M, Kidnapping, Michael has feelings and he doesn't like it, Minor Character Death, Past Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Past Child Abuse, Plot Twists, Reader and Michael are childhood sweethearts, Reader is a BAMF, Reader is a criminal, Second Chance Romance, Smut, Tommy and Reader are frenemies, Unplanned Pregnancy, Vaginal Fingering, Vaginal Sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-08
Updated: 2020-12-29
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:33:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 21
Words: 60,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26696059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Smallheathen/pseuds/Smallheathen
Summary: He puts a cigarette between his lips and drags smoke into his lungs. Your eyes lock as the butt of his cigarette lights up, illuminating the sharp, handsome angles of his face for a split-second.The recognition hits you with such singular force, the glass nearly slips from your hand.A name you rarely allowed yourself to think these past seven years, let alone speak out loud, leaves your lips on a small breath."Henry."~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~You and Michael Gray share a past and plenty of demons, but will you share a future?[Peaky Blinders Season 3 - 5]I'm cross-posting this fic to my tumblr (@smallheathbaby)
Relationships: Michael Gray/Original Female Character(s), Michael Gray/Reader, Michael Gray/You, Tommy Shelby & Original Female Character(s), Tommy Shelby & Reader
Comments: 140
Kudos: 131





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm cross-posting this fic to my tumblr (@smallheathbaby)!

_1915_

It starts with a wishing well. This one looks nothing like those in the fairy tales–all pretty white bricks and enchanted frogs. No, it’s little more than a murky waterhole behind the orphanage's bleak, gray main building, that fills and dries up depending on the whims of the ever-changeable British weather.

None of the other children know about it. It's your safe place. A place where you go to escape the nuns' lashings or Father Hughes' wandering hands. Sometimes both. It's the only place in this world that feels like it truly belongs to you.

Until one afternoon, when you come down to the waterhole, wiping tears from your cold cheeks, and find that your favorite spot is already occupied.

The trespasser is a young, pale boy with reserved, serious eyes and an ugly bruise spreading across his angular cheekbone. He's maybe a year older and a good head taller than you. He's new here. You remember seeing him at breakfast earlier today, sitting apart from the other boys, staring down at the untouched bowl of gruel (rations are scarce in wartime, especially for people living on the charity of others) in front of him. Homeless and unwanted just like you.

The boy looks up and frowns at you. "Why are you crying?"

Embarrassed to be caught in such a state, you hastily brush the last of your tears away. "Am not," you mumble, eyes downcast.

When his frown deepens, you nudge a clump of grass and earth with the tip of your shoe. "Today was visiting day," you say in a small voice.

You’re not sure why you’re telling him this but, for some reason, you can't stop the words from tumbling out. "There is this young couple of newlyweds–the Burnses. They've been visiting me for a few months. They're nice. Mrs. Burns brought me a doll on my birthday. The prettiest thing you ever saw with golden hair and rosy porcelain cheeks. They were going to take me home with them, they said."

"That doesn't make you happy?" The corners of his mouth turn down. "You want to stay here?"

Your shoulders slump as you shake your head.

"Then why–"

"Because they don't want me anymore!" you sob, your lips wobbling. "Mrs. Burns is getting a baby of her own. I'm not needed anymore. I'd only be a burden." Admitting the truth is humiliating, and god, it hurts, knowing that you came so close the one thing you always dreamed of: a family. "Mr. Burns came to tell me today. Mrs. Burns didn't come with him. She didn't even say goodbye."

The new boy doesn't say anything for a while, only looks at you in a way that makes you feel strangely seen.

"What happened to your cheek?" You ask to fill the silence that stretches between you. He looks away, his hand covering the purple bruise.

You twist your fingers in the coarse fabric of your gray smock. "Father Hughes." It's not a question. Every part of you cringes and recoils at the sound of His name, even coming from your own lips. "He's an evil man."

Slowly as if you're approaching a spooked horse, you sink down in the dry grass beside him. "But he can't hurt us here." You wet your lips. "This can be your secret place too, you know. We can share it if you like."

"I'm Henry," he says after a minute of companionable silence where only the swaying of the trees and the rustle of robins nesting high up in its branches can be heard. "At least that's what the Martins called me. It's not my real name, I think."

"I'm Y/N," you say and offer him your hand, a shy smile curving your lips. "I was born here so I only have that name.”

He doesn't smile back but he takes your tiny hand in his, and somehow that seems much more significant.

~

Summer tips into fall. The weather turns foul, and your wishing well overflows with the constant rain, swelling with sludgy brown water and soggy, rotten leaves.

You don't see much of Henry, since the matron makes sure to strictly separate boys and girls throughout the day, except for a few stolen glances at dinner time, but you hear his name whispered in the girls dormitory after lights-out.

The other girls think he's dashing; his quiet focus and cool reserve a delightful mystery to them.

For a while, you think the bruise he got on his first day at St. Hilda’s isn't healing properly, but when the bruise looks fresh two whole months after his arrival, you realize that they're new bruises.  
He isn't getting into brawls like some of the other boys, so there's only one explanation left. You can't bear to look at Father Hughes at dinner anymore.

It's not until mid-winter that the two of you meet face to face again.  
One of the older boys at St. Hilda’s—a cruel brute called Billy Sturgis–has you backed up against a wall, his thick arm cutting off your airflow as his gang of dunderheaded bullies cheer him on.

Billy has had it out for you from the start, but his aggression and taunts toward you never turned into anything physical. Until now, that is.

His meaty hands feel different from Father Hughes clammy, disturbingly gentle ones, but just they make your skin crawl all the same.

"You're just a fucking tease, Y/L/N! Let's see what you're hiding under those ugly skirts," Billy hisses, speckles of his spit hitting your cheek. He smells like old ham and sour breath.

You can feel yourself go quiet and awareness leave your body.  
Your senses dull as your consciousness hides in a small, safe compartment of your brain where nothing and nobody can touch you. In your mind you're already sitting by the wishing well, which is frozen over this time of year. You can't hear the catcalling and cruel jokes of Billy's cronies, your ears feeling like their stuffed with cotton rounds.

Suddenly, before you can come back into your body, Billy is thrown off of you, and you stagger free.

The jarring motion is accompanied by the bone-splitting crack of knuckles again Billy's jaw. Your knees give in as you suck oxygen into your sore lungs. Disoriented and panting hard, you watch blood and spittle fly from Billy's mouth as Henry's fist makes contact with the older boy's face again and again and again.

"I'll gut you, you little rat!" Billy lands a punch to Henry's ribs that makes him double over, and deals a brutal kick to his side.

"No! Leave him alone!" You cry and try to push to your feet, but your legs fold beneath you like an old lawn chair. Useless.

The fight between the two boys is on the verge of escalating into a bloodbath when the sound of nearing footsteps and the clack-clack of a cane echo down the corridor.

"Fuck, it's that old swamp witch, Paylor."

"Better run."

"C'mon Billy! They're not worth it." They call as they scramble and flee in the other direction.

Billy wipes his bleeding mouth with his sleeve, his eyes burning with hatred. His left eye is already swelling shut.

"You've made an enemy today, new boy. Better hope she's worth it." He looks over his shoulder and kicks Henry, who is on his knees, one last time, before he runs after his friends.

You crawl toward Henry, ignoring how dizzy you still feel. He has a busted lip, and he winces when he tries to sit up.

"Are you alright?" You gasp. "Here let me clean that for you."  
You reach out to dap his bleeding lip with the sleeve of your dress but he flinches from your touch, wariness flashing in his eyes.  
He doesn't trust you, even after what he's done for you just now.

"I'm fine," he says tightly and pulls away. "You'll get blood on your dress. I don't want to ruin it."

You look down at the schoolmarmish black dress.  
"You couldn't ruin it," you say and gently reach over once more. This time he allows you to clean away the blood, never once breaking eye contact with you. You barely notice the stains on your dress.

The moment is broken when Sister Paylor rounds the corner, her expression severe.  
"What's the meaning of this racket?" She demands in that shrill, hawkish voice of hers as she points her cane at you. "Out with it! Have you been fighting? Lord in in heaven, is that blood on your uniform, young miss? You'll be seeing Father Hughes right now!"

You never talk about the hours you each spend in the priest's office that night but from that moment on, the two of you are inseparable.

There were no grand gestures or offers of friendship that initiated it, just a silent understanding that you'd be looking out for one another from now on. For months, it's you and Henry against the rest of the world.

You plan to run away together. Somewhere where you can see the sea. Wales maybe, or to the white cliffs of Dover.

Henry is at the top of his class in every subject. He's smart–much too smart for St. Hilda’s. He'd be able to get good, honest work somewhere, you're sure of it.

His thirteenth birthday. That's when you decided to turn your plan into reality. Your few belongings barely fill the duffle bag you've stashed beneath your bed.

The nuns patrol the dormitories every hour. They shine their lantern into your face as you pretend to be asleep, then move down the row of beds to the next girl. Your shoe-clad feet are well-hidden under the thin blanket, and your heart pounds.  
Anticipation and fear of the unknown sit heavily in the pit of your stomach as you wait for the clocktower in the village to strike midnight.

When it does, you get out of bed, fully dressed, and stuff the pillow under the blanket, arranging it so it looks like a vaguely human-shaped lump.  
With any luck, they wouldn't suspect anything until morning.

Careful not to alert the other girls, you sneak toward the door, and slink out into the dark hallway.  
Thankfully, you don't run into anyone on your way outside. Nights are chilly this early in April.

You pull your coat and the thin shawl closer around yourself as you stepped into the yard, and climb over the iron fence.  
It's harder to do in the dark but you've been doing it for years and your footing is sure. With every step you take the possibility of freedom becomes more real.

Yesterday at lunch, you and Henry agreed to meet by the wishing well. In your mind, you see him standing there, waiting for you, his hands shoved in his pant pockets, and smiling that rare smile of his that creases his cheeks when he thinks people aren't looking.

But when you reach the wishing well, there's no sign of Henry.  
Anxiety pools in your behind your navel. It wasn't like him to be late. He couldn't have left without you, right? He would never do that, you reason and sit down in your usual spot, arms hugging your legs to your chest.  
He'll come. Henry always comes for me.

You wait an hour, then another.

Shivers ripple down your spine, arms and legs. Did something happen to him? Did one of the nuns catch him and report to Father Hughes? Was he being punished right now?

Cold dread clutches your heart.

You consider going back to the house and looking for him, but every time you make to stand up and leave, Henry's voice fills your head. Wait for me, Y/N. I'll be there, I promise.

When the sun starts to shine through the morning mist, and rise above the smog of the city, you can't hold the tears at bay any longer.  
You cry until your eyes feel puffy and you can taste salt on your tongue, you lift your head from your knees.

You have no choice but to head back inside before the morning call alerts everyone to your absence.

Your bedsheets are undisturbed, the unshapely pillow still were you left it beneath the blankets.  
You don't bother to take off your shoes before you crawl in. There's only one question in your mind as you drift off to sleep, despite the tears still leaking from your eyes: What happened?

Two hours later, you sit at the long wooden table in the mess hall, and steal glances at the boys table, searching for Henry's apologetic face among the yawning sea of sleepy, famished children.

His chair is empty, and it remains so for the rest of the meal.

The unease and confusion you felt before turns to a hard knot of panic in the back of your throat. What if he's sick? It's torture to stay put until the tolling of the bells releases you when there's nothing you want more than to race up to the boys dormitories to see him.

You are almost up the creaking stairs that lead to the boys wing when a loud voice stops you in your tracks.

"What are you doing here, young lady?" It's Sister Paylor, her nun habit flapping like the black wings of a bird as she cuts into your path. "You're not supposed to be up here."

"It's urgent–"

"It's indecent, that's what it is," the nun says sharply. "Turn around and go back to your lessons, shoo."

"I'm telling you, it's important. My friend–"

”The Martin boy? You two are as thick as thieves." She clicks he tongue. "He's no longer with us, I'm afraid. Another family has taken him in. You see, he doesn't need you anymore."

Her words barely reach you through the numbness that covers your mind like sheets of fog. Gone. Henry was gone?

He doesn't need you anymore.

No, this couldn't be right.

"There must be a mistake. He wouldn't leave without saying goodbye," you say with a trembling voice.

"Oh child, but that's exactly what he did. I see he hasn't told you." Her sallow, stern mouth curled. "He was probably concerned that you would refuse to let him go, jealous, possessive little creature that you are."

"Where did they take him?" Misery sharpens your voice to the edge of a razor blade, and your hands are curled into little fists at your side. "Where is he? Where did they take him?"

Sister Paylor lifts her nose. "This information is highly confidential. It's none of–"

The painful coil in the back of your throat snaps. You fall apart. "WHERE IS HE? I WANT HENRY!"

"Wardens!"

Footsteps rush toward you.

"NO! NOOO! LET ME GO. HENRY! HENRYYYY!" You scream and fight and scratch as two wardens grab your arms, cruelly twist them behind your back, and force you to the cold, hard floor.

"Take her to Father Hughes," Sister Paylor instructs them.

You put up a hell of a fight all the way to the priest's office, but all of it leaves you as soon as the door falls shut and you're alone with the man.

Father Hughes is sitting behind his desk. He smiles, and steeples his hands as he takes in your shaking, crying form.

His smile widens a fraction. "Let us pray."


	2. Chapter 2

8 years later...

1923

You can't get enough of the vibrant, frenzied atmosphere at the Eden Club.

The fumes are like a drug to you. The hot, sweaty press of bodies writhing on the dance floor, the beaded fringe of women's dresses reflecting the light of the chandeliers, cocaine dusting the elegant mahogany tables like to powdery snow, and the heavy musk of sex and exotic perfume hanging in the stale air like cigarette smoke. 

It's intoxicating.

The music the jazz band plays is almost too loud for comfort as you weft through the ecstatic crowd, back to your date, namely the very owner of this nightclub–an Italian gang leader by the name of Darby Sabini. 

You met him at the races in Epsom, last weekend.  
You didn't come for the horses or the race.  
No, you came for the toffs and their mistresses who were too busy staring at the racetracks and betting money they didn't actually have to notice you slipping your hand into their pockets. 

You were on a winning streak that day. Until you had the goddamn misfortune of sticking your hand into the wrong pocket–that of the big man, Darby Sabini, himself. 

You'd been forced to improvise to keep him from putting a bullet in your brain on the spot, but you were nothing if not creative, and your hand was already halfway down his pants before he could get suspicious.  
The quick tug and fumble in the bathroom allayed whatever suspicion he might have had, and by the end of it, you had him pretty much eating out of your hand. 

He hand-picked and bought you the dress you're wearing tonight. Considering what you're expected to do in return for it, it's not a bad trade. Be his beautiful and silent arm candy while he talks business with a rivaling gang in one of the club's lavishly furnished backrooms.

Luxuriously sleek yellow silk clings to every curve of your body, and with a plunging neckline and a brazen slit that goes up to your right thigh, it catches many eyes across the room.

It's by far the most expensive thing you've ever worn. 

Two of Sabini's men are stationed at the door. You smile at them sweetly and they let you pass with not so much as an acknowledging nod. 

The backroom is dimly lit. More of Sabini's bodyguards are positioned around the room, finger on the trigger and ready to shoot at the slightest affront. 

Sabini and three men in handsome, tailored suits, two of them wearing flat caps, sit in armchairs in front of a empty fireplace.  
Cigarette smoke sails over their heads like storm clouds. 

The Peaky Blinders. 

You shudder inwardly. 

You've heard of them, of course. Who hasn't? Gambling, racketeering, bribery, robbery, extortion, and murder–their list of crimes is long and bloody. 

Everyone in the city is sleeping a little lighter at night ever since they decided to expand their territory and conquer London. 

Tommy Shelby isn't what you expected. He looks...mortal. Not a ruthless god, but a man of flesh and bone. This man in front of you looks almost civilized. 

His piercing blue gaze doesn't stray from Sabini as you sit down on the Italian's lap, the slit of your dress parting and riding up as the man slides his hand up your thigh. 

Sabini puts and arm around your shoulder and starts to draw circles above your knee with his beringed middle finger, his wedding band cold against your skin, but doesn't acknowledge you further.

Forcing your shoulders to relax, your gaze falls to the other two Blinders. 

The one on Tommy Shelby's right looks uncomfortable, stretched thin. He is clearly the oldest of the three. The lines on his face are deeper, his mustache already beginning to gray. He's jittery, bouncing his knee. There's something restless, wild, about him that reminds you of a caged tiger you'd once scene at London Zoo, endlessly pacing the confines of its prison with bared teeth.

The man on Shelby's left is significantly younger than Shelby and his brother, much closer to your own age. He looks more like a proper gentleman than a gangster from some sooty shithole in the West Midlands. 

Everything about him exudes an image of perfect control. There's not a single wrinkle in his pants or waistcoat, his brown hair styled with a clean-cut precision. He probably isn't wearing the Blinders' signature flat cap for fear of messing up his hair. The thought makes you smirk. You didn't think vanity was one of the Peaky Blinders many vices.

You try to ignore the way Sabini's hand has wandered to the inside of your thigh in the last minute, playing with the delicate French lace trimming of your garter. 

Eyes on the prize, Y/N. Eyes on the prize.

You're more sober than you'd like. You knock back the whiskey in your hand, relishing in the burn as it glides down your throat, and return your gaze to the young man on Tommy Shelby's left.

He puts a cigarette between his lips and drags smoke into his lungs. Your eyes lock as the butt of his cigarette lights up, illuminating the sharp, handsome angles of his face for a split-second.

The recognition hits you with such singular force, the glass nearly slips from your hand. 

A name you rarely allowed yourself to think these past seven years, let alone speak out loud, leaves your lips on a small breath. 

Henry. 

Your friend. 

The only person who's ever made you feel safe. He's changed so much. No longer the skinny boy with a bruised lip and a brilliant mind you knew, but someone who'd moved up in the world, or down considering his line of work.

You see recognition flare in those coolly calculating eyes at the same time it hits you. 

His reaction is more subtle than yours, unnoticeable to someone who doesn't know him and his mannerisms like you do. It's in the abrupt tensing of his shoulders, the slight shudder in his exhale as he blows smoke from his mouth. 

Even though the last seven years have made him a stranger, it's obvious to you what he's thinking. You are the last person he expected in a place like this.

Henry's blue-green eyes take you in–your face, your yellow satin dress that leaves so very little to the imagination–then they flash to Sabini's possessive hand on your thigh. He goes very still.

"–and our bookies won't get in the way of yours. No more chalking. Consider it a temporary truce." Tommy Shelby's voice cuts through the rushing of blood in your ears. "Do we have a deal or not?"

Sabini pulls his hand from your thigh and takes the cigar out of his mouth.

"See, the problem is I don't trust any of you peaky fucks. Not after what happened at the Derby, last year, when your brothers burned my bookies’ gaming licenses. It's very hard to trust anyone these days. Everyone's a liar, Tommy. Take my girl Angel here."

Without warning, Sabini grabs your face and roughly turns it toward the light. Out of the corner of your eyes you see Henry sit forward. 

"Exquisite little thing, isn't she? Now see, Angel has been stealing from me and my guests all fucking night, isn't that right, tresoro?" He says pleasantly, but his hand squeezes your jaw so hard your teeth hurt, and his short nails cut into your cheeks. The weight of the Rolex you've removed from Sabini's wrist and slipped into your brassiere, earlier this evening, scalds your skin. 

Fuck.

"Darby–" You try to soothe him but he only crushes your jaw harder.

"She lied about being an actress when she's just some thieving back alley whore who thinks she can take whatever she wants from a man like me. Cazzo, her name probably isn't even Angel."

You feel the cold kiss of a gun between your eyes, the click of the safety coming off reverberate through your bones.

You hear Tommy Shelby give a bored sigh. "Is this really necessary, Sabini?"

Sabini ignores him. "Get up," he growls and knocks you from his lap to the floor, the gun still pointing at your head. "You'll take your clothes off, and you won't stop until every last fucking piece you stole from me tonight is laid out on this fucking carpet."

You glare up at him, defiant, though that's mostly the liquor talking.

"Vaffanculo a chi t’è morto," you spit. It's amazing in how many languages one can swear if one lives the life you do. You could curse better in Italian than in English.

Sabini rams the barrel of the gun against the side of your head, making your world flash white for a second. "Take. Them. Off."

"Don't touch her." Henry has leaped up, black revolved in his white-knuckled hand. He doesn't look at you. His attention is fixed on Sabini. Around the room, Sabini's goons cock their guns, and aim them at the Peaky Blinders.

"Well fookin’ done, Michael," The man with the mustache bellows, and draws a Webley from its leather holster. The situation is close to escalating.

Tommy Shelby grabs Henry's shoulder from behind, his voice deceptively calm but fraught with tension. "Michael, this isn't our business. She's not our responsibility. Now lower the fucking gun and let us talk reasonably."

"Michael?" You ask, swallowing hard. Turns out you're not the only one who goes by a different name these days.

Sabini swears in Italian. "She's one of yours? A Peaky fucking Blinder?" He rages, waving the revolver before your face.

You're not sure who shoots first. 

The gunshot rings out, and the sound seems to rip a hole in the air as it noisily explodes between your ears. 

You jerk, eyes clenched shut, but no pain follows. 

Glass shatters, and two of Sabini's goons storm the room. 

Someone pushes you out of the way and flat to the floor as both sides fire on each other. The shot meant for you has instead found its mark in a nearby vase. 

Breathing hard, you look up to see Henry standing over you, his hand clasping the back of your neck to keep you down, and out of the crossfire.

He ducks his head as a bullet whizzes past his ear, missing him by an inch.

"You have to get out of here" he shouts over the deafening bangs of the discharging guns.

The words lie heavy on your tongue. I'm not leaving you. What happened to you? Who is Michael? Why did you leave me? Come with me.

But then one of Sabini's men throws a punch at him, and he turns his back to you to fight him off, crashing his first into the man's face. There is a brutality, a mercilessness in him that wasn't there before. 

In that moment you know that Henry is gone, and this young, cold man that replaced him, you don't know him at all.

He was right, though. Being in the middle of gunfight without a weapon is an extraordinarily stupid idea, even for drunk you.

The long hem of your dress tangles around your legs, and tiny shards of broken glass prick your palms as you crawl behind the overturned couch.

Lucky for you, the men are too busy beating the living shite out of each other to pay attention to you. 

The Blinders are outnumbered three to five but somehow manage to hold their own in this fight. 

It's a short sprint to the door–twenty paces at most. Chest heaving, you lunge forward. You're almost out the door when a trail of fiery pain licks across the side of your bare arm. 

You cry out. 

Warm wetness runs down the inside of your arm as you stumble out into the Eden Club's main room, where the party is still in full swing.  
The music is louder than before. Most likely to drown out the sound of the gunshots lest they scare away the customers.

You can feel the blood drip to the floor. Covering the bleeding wound with your hand, you move at a deliberately unhurried pace, and paint a smile on your face to match the euphoric crowd. Shock and the rest liquor in your blood mute the pain in your arm to a dull burn but you will feel the full extent of it soon enough.

The bouncers don't stop you as you walk through the club's doors, sidestepping puddles of vomit. 

Out here it's a typical summer night in London's West End. The people still out on the streets are too drunk or high to care that your dress is stained with blood. 

You keep your head down. 

Fortunately, your flat on Old Compton Street is not far from here.

You nearly pass out as you drag yourself up the three flight of stairs that lead up to the flat you rent for eight pounds a month. 

Panting, you let your forehead fall forward against the door as you lock up. Your fingers are shaking slight and it takes you four tries to insert the key into the keyhole. 

The flat is small and dark and stinks of mice and moldy tapestries, but it's far from the worst place you've ever put your head down. No, as far as you're concerned, this place is the fucking Ritz compared to the cramped, sickness-ridden dormitories at St. Hilda’s.

You close the door with your back, and stagger into the kitchen.  
Grabbing a bottle of cheap gin from the upper shelf above the oven, you collapse into a chair, and view the damage. 

It looks worse than it is. 

The bullet didn't go through, but merely grazed your arm.  
Opening the bottle with your teeth, you take a big swallow, then press your lips together, and pour the disgusting stuff over the wound. It hurts like a bitch, but the sharp sting is preferable to an infection in the morning, you know from experience.

You take one of the cleaner kitchen rags, and tie it around your arm, securing it with a double knot.

When that's done, you take another gulp from the bottle, determined to get blackout drunk tonight. At the very least it would take your mind off of Henry–or was it Michael now?

You look down at the faded, white scar on your thumb. You rub your thumb and index finger together, feeling the slightly raised skin. It's small, barely a nick. Henry had taken care to not make the cut too deep. 

The whole thing had been your idea. Henry thought blood oaths were rubbish, and he'd told you as much, but he'd done it to humor you. 

And when you'd pressed your thumb against his and watched your blood mingle, he'd asked you to marry him. He'd been flustered by his own suggestion, flushing as soon as the words left his mouth. It was a thing silly to say. You 11, he 12, with no prospects, no home, no future outside of the orphanage's gray brick walls. 

Looking back on it, you don't think he'd meant it in a romantic way. Just like you, Henry had been desperate in his own way to bind himself to someone; to belong. Perhaps he'd found that belonging with the Peaky Blinders, if not with the family that had adopted him.

Years ago, you'd tried to track him down yourself, but the parish had refused to give out any information about his whereabouts or the family who'd taken him in. It was like he'd never existed in the first place, and through the years, you sometimes found yourself questioning whether the boy by your wishing well was real, or if he was a figment of a lonely child's overactive imagination.

You mean to wash the memories down with another swig, but realize the bottle is empty. "Damn."

You know that you're going to have to disappear for a while, lay low until things with Sabini have blown over.

Plunging a hand between your breasts and into your brassiere, you pull out a pocket watch with a heavy gold chain and an engraved back. You won't be able to sell the bloody thing on any London black market, that's for sure. Not as long as Sabini continues to have his hands in everyone's pocket. Yes, you could use a change of scenery.

A proper vacation. 

Paris, maybe? 

Or Rome? 

The decision forms in your mind. Now that you think about it, you've always wanted to see the Statue of Liberty for yourself.


	3. Chapter 3

  
_1924_

You pull up in front of Tommy Shelby’s country pile in Harvey’s Silver Ghost. The house is bloody massive, with marble fountains and a wing for each family member.

“You look beautiful tonight, Celia,” Harvey tells you as he turns off the car engine. You feel his fingertips softly run down your bare back, tracing your spine and shoulder blades. The silver silk dress you chose covers you from neck to toe in the front, but plunges in the back, ending just short of the dimples above your ass.

“You don’t look so bad yourself,” you say with a coy smile.

Harvey Routledge is the oldest son of Carlisle Routledge, New York’s richest press baron and sole proprietor of the East Coast Observer. Handsome, disarmingly charming, and confident.

Being the heir, he is going to inherit his father’s company in a not too distant future. All these factors make him one of the most eligible bachelors on the East Coast. And you’re sitting in his very large, very comfortable car, on your way to meet his family after just three short months of nightly dinners in the city’s most exclusive restaurants and scenic drives to Coney Island. You haven’t even slept together yet, but Harvey seems to be pretty serious about the two of you.

You… let’s just say you’re used to leaving your options open.

You check your lipstick in the car’s mirror, and pout at your reflection. The color is perhaps a little too bold for tonight’s company, but the red looks stunning on you.

“Ready to face the pack?” Harvey asks jokingly, his fingers still on your neck. “So tense. Don’t worry, Grace will adore you.” He rubs the taunt muscles in your nape.

You let the lipstick bullet disappear in your pearl-beaded purse and sigh. “It’s not her I’m worried about.”

No, she isn’t the reason why your hands are cold with nerves and why your heart is beating too loud and too fast on the off chance of running into Him. It makes no bloody sense that even after all these years, Henry still manages to have this effect on you.

Harvey clicks his tongue. “You’re worried about Thomas Shelby, baby? I heard he’s an alright fellow. Won two medals in the war. And besides, he can’t be that bad if my cousin agreed to marry him. Grace doesn’t settle for anything less than the best.”

The hilarity and obliviousness of that statement nearly makes you burst out laughing.

 _If only you knew, Harv_.

It turns out that most of the Burgesses and the Routledges, who are Grace’s family on her mother’s side, are in the dark about Tommy’s shadier dealings. Or the fact that he is a literal gang leader who killed more men after the war than when he was in the trenches.

“If you say so. Let’s go. I’m getting cold,” is all you say as you gaze up at the massive, lit up estate through the fogging windshield. Only dirty money can buy such wealth and extravagance. Of course, Harvey’s family wouldn’t know. They come from old money–a lesser branch of Irish nobility that dates back to the William the Conqueror or some other dead, royal bugger you don’t care enough to remember.

Suddenly, your car door opens. You haven’t even noticed that Harvey got out of the car. He offers his hand to you with that cocky smile that makes women on both sides of the Atlantic weak in the knees. He tosses the car keys to a valet in black-and-white livery and leads you toward the house’s grand entrance, gravel crunching beneath your shoes.

Shelby really spared no expenses for his wedding day. Only the best for Harv’s cousin.

At the door, a butler takes your coats as a server hands each of you a fluted glass of bubbly champagne. It tastes like money.

“Let’s see if we can find Grace. I want her to meet you.” Harvey slides his arm around your waist and leads you through an elegant, wood-paneled foyer into a spacious, tastefully appointed salon where most of the guest are mingling. A band is playing soft jazz on the far side of the room.

It’s glaringly obvious who belongs on the bride’s side and who belongs on the groom’s side.

The women in Grace’s family are all decked in sparkling jewels and the finest clothes money can buy, while the men parade around in their starched, red cavalry uniforms with perpetually disapproving faces. Despite the hosts’ best efforts, there is an underlying tension in the room.

Harvey stops here and there to introduce you to a distant cousin or a great-aunt, but eventually you make your way to a beautiful blonde woman in a gorgeous violet dress. Her face lights up as she catches sight of you.

“Harvey,” she cries and throws her arms around your date, giggling like a young girl as he swings her around.

“Gracie!” Harvey sets her down, the two of them grinning at each other. “Look at you. Marriage becomes you. Where is the lucky groom?”

“That’s what I’d like to know too,” Grace laughs. “Not 2 hours married and he’s already hiding from me.”

“Tell me when he needs a good talking to. I’ll straighten him out.”

She slaps his chest. “Like you did to the Dooley boy when we were children? The poor boy was terrified of you! God Harvey, how long has it been? Three years? We don’t see enough of each other. Always so busy in that office of yours.” She turns to beam at you warmly. “Does this young lady, perhaps, have anything to do with that?”

“Grace, this is Celia Bodine, my–”

“I’m so happy to finally meet you. Harv spoke of you on the phone.” Grace enfolds you in her arms and pecks your cheeks. Her unguarded kindness takes you aback.

“Congratulations on your wedding. You have a beautiful home, Mrs. Shelby.”

“I insist you call me Grace, Celia.” She links your elbows and draws you toward a cluster of plush sofas, leaving Harvey to talk to one of his cousins. “I positively love your dress. Is it Elsa Schiaparelli? I would recognize her work anywhere.”

The two of you continue to chat about New York, where Grace lived years ago with her previous husband. You don’t ask what’s become of him. If even half the rumors about Tommy Shelby are true, he likely had him assassinated and stuffed his body in a wood chipper. It’s completely beyond you why a woman as gentle and luminous as Grace would marry a man with so much blood on his hands.

After a while, a nanny waves at Grace from across the room, and the woman excuses herself with a apologetic smile. “My son, Charlie,” she adds by way of explanation. “He’s at that age where he refuses to go to sleep without a bed time story from me or his papa. We’ll talk more later.” And then she’s off.

You decide to go looking for Harvey in the crowd of blond-haired Burgesses and dark-haired Shelbys.

That’s when your gaze snags on him.

It feels like the floor drops out from beneath you, your stomach bottoming out. Henry stands not fifteen feet away from you as he talks with a smartly dressed, young black man. The friend catches your gaze first, smirks–cock-sure–and lightly elbows Henry, pointing you out to him.

Henry’s gaze snaps to you, and his face darkens. You notice how his hands clench in his pant pockets. He doesn’t look particularly happy to see you. He shoulders past his friend, who let’s out a whistle as if impressed by Henry’s bold initiative, and strides toward you.

Your skin prickles. It’s in that moment as he stalks across the room, his eyes set on you, his jaw working, that you feel like cornered prey.

What a ridiculous thought, you scold yourself. It’s Henry for fuck’s sake.

_Pull yourself together, Y/N._

He can’t have changed that much in just a few years.

Without saying a word, Henry grabs you by the wrist, and pulls you away from the other guests. You let him drag you into a busy, but secluded hallway. Servers bustle past you, carrying platters laden with steaming vegetables, cut meats, and buttered potatoes. The clattering of silverware can be heard from the kitchens.

“Henry, if you’d stop manhandling me for one bloody second and talk to–”

He has you pinned to the tiled wall by your shoulders before the words are out. His grip isn’t hard but his eyes are.

“What are you doing here, Y/N?” He asks curtly.

You search his face, searching for the boy who took care of your cuts and bruises after you left Hughes offices, beneath the cool, unreadable mask. “All these years, and that’s what you say to me, Henry?”

He winces at the sound of his old name. “It’s Michael now. That’s what my mother named me. Now answer the question. Why are you here?”

You lift your chin. “I have an invitation. Bride’s side.”

He frowns, but before he can continue his interrogation, you cut in, “how do you know Michael is your real name?”

“I found my family," he says. "Well, they found me first, actually. My father died years ago, but my mother is still alive. She’s lived in Birmingham, all this time, not twenty miles from me.” His voice has a bitter edge to it, like he resents the fact that the thing he so desperately longed for had been in his reach all along.

Hesitant, you put a hand on his chest, just beneath the red flower pinned to the lapels of his suit jacket. He looks at it, but doesn’t move to pull away. It’s a start. “Hen–Michael, that’s wonderful.” You truly mean it, but, at the same time, you can’t help but feel a stab of jealousy. That he found his people–a family. A family that doesn’t include you. He owes you nothing, a small voice in the back of your head whispers. You’re your own people now.

“Was it her who took you away from St. Hilda’s?”

His gaze drops. He lets his hands fall from your shoulders, but doesn’t step back to put more distance between you. “No, I was with another family for a while. I left the Johnsons two years ago to look for my mum.”

You quirk an eyebrow. “And your mum is fine with you joining some cut-throat razor gang?”

He says nothing.

Realization strikes you like a brick in the face. “Bloody hell,” you whisper, and drop your hand from his chest. “Your mum is a fucking Shelby.”

“Gray,” he corrects. “She’s a Gray, not a Shelby. I’m their cousin.”

“Fuck,” is all you manage as you try to wrap your head around the fact that the boy you grew up with is related to one of Britain’s most notorious crime families. “So, what is it you do for them? Beat people up? Cut them smiles like you did at Sabini’s club?”

“I’m the company’s chief accountant,” he says dryly. Oh, thank you, god. You don’t know what you would have done if he’d said assassin. Not that the work he’s doing for the Shelbys is completely legal. You’re not naive enough to believe that. “You were always good with numbers.”

“Yeah.” He rubs the back of his neck, appearing almost nervous, all of the sudden–his cool exterior and polished poise crumbling. A short, awkward silence hangs between you as you look at each other. There’s too much to say, but no words seem good enough. You’re very aware of his closeness, the sharp lines of his jaw, the softness of his mouth, and his familiar, clean scent of peppermint and shaving soap, mixed with something darker that wasn’t there before.

Michael wets his lips. “You never answered my letters.”

“You sent me letters?” Your voice betrays your shock.

“A few…I mean for the first two years…you never answered so I stopped.”

“I never received a single letter from you or anyone.” A mean, bony face the color of sour curd flashes before your mind’s eye. “She must have taken them. Sister Paylor.”

“That pinch-faced bint,” he curses under his breath. He pushes away from the wall, rubbing a hand over his mouth. When he turns back to you, there is that distance in his eyes again, a cigarette between his fingers. He lights it. “It hardly matters now. It’s in the past.” He offers you the cigarette box. “You smoke?”

Nodding, you’re about to take one for yourself when a male voice interrupts you. “There you are! I’ve been looking all over for you, baby.”

You think you see Michael’s eyes narrow as Harvey ambles toward you–or it’s the cigarette smoke playing tricks on your eyes.

“They’re serving dinner now,” Harvey announces, and puts his hand on the small of your back. “Don’t you want to introduce me to this young gentleman, Celia? A friend of yours?” You know his words are meant to be condescending. Michael knows it too.

Harvey is twenty-nine, making him nearly a decade older than Michael–or you, for that matter.

“Michael Gray,” Michael says before you have a chance to open your mouth.

“Harvey Routledge.”

He shakes Harvey’s offered hand after he considers it for a brief moment. Their handshake is a little too firm to be friendly.

“Well, absolute pleasure meeting you, Mr. Gray.” Harvey gives your waist a squeeze, and guides you to the door. “Come on, baby. They’re waiting for us.”

“Of course,” you say, slipping smoothly into a New Yorker accent. You feel Michael’s gaze resting heavy on your back as you let yourself be pulled away from him and back to the party.


	4. Chapter 4

During dinner, you are stuck between the oldest Shelby brother, Arthur, who is sweating profusely, and a modestly-dressed, blonde woman, who wears more crosses than all the nuns at St. Hilda’s wore combined. Both of them aren't the most conversational dinner partners.

Your gaze keeps sliding to Michael at the other end of the dinner table, where he sits next to a pretty, doe-eyed brunette. He hasn't looked your way once between the hors d'oeuvres and the main course.

_Get your head straight, girl._

Irritated, you stab at a potato with your fork. On the other side of the table, Harvey is entertaining his aunt, uncle, and Grace with the story of how you two met at a party in Queens, a few months ago.

You nearly choke on a Brussel sprout when Tommy Shelby addresses you from the head of the table.

"Have we met before, Miss Bodine?" He asks casually, his pale blue eyes boring into yours in a way that's anything but casual. It's like the man can see through flesh and bone, right into your fucking soul. And he doesn't like what he sees.

"There's something about you that seems... familiar."

You go still. Did he recognize you from the Eden Club? Surely not. For all he knows, that girl at the club was some nameless back alley tarte, hardly someone Thomas Shelby would take notice of, much less remember.

You swallow, and carefully put your fork and knife down before you answer. "I don't believe we have, Mr. Shelby. This is my first time in the mother country."

"I see." He makes a thoughtful noise and you feel as though you're balancing on a fine wire. "What business did you say your family is involved in again?"

You reach for your wine glass, touch the rim to your lips. "Horses, mainly."

"Oh?" Tommy lifts a dark brow. "Maybe we'll do business with your father someday."

“My father is a very private man, Mr. Shelby.” You smile politely, and sip on your wine. It's too tangy for your taste but you'll down the whole glass if it means you don't have to answer any more of the man's questions.

“That’s right.” Harvey chuckles, his cheeks red from too much wine. “Never seen the old man. I’m starting to think he doesn’t exist.”

You're saved by the arrival of the second main course. The rest of the dinner passes quickly, and afterward, the guests pile into a sitting room turned ballroom for the bride and groom's first dance.

After the newlywed couple concludes their turn about the room, the music changes to a livelier, fast-paced jazz number and the real dancing begins.

You head over to the bar, and order a Mint Julep. Something is in the air tonight. As though the dancing, the music and general merriment tonight are nothing but a smokescreen for bigger things handled in the shadows.

You can't put your finger on it, until you notice that all the Blinders and most of the cavalry men, including Harvey, have vacated the room and are nowhere to be seen. A looking sense of unease coils at the base of your spine.

You know what they say about him. Tommy Shelby never walks away from a business deal. Not even on his wedding day.

"You're not American," a female voice sounds from behind you. The woman who sits at the bar is in her forties, with dark brown curls and eyes.

"Pardon, ma'am?"

Taking the cigarette from between her lips, she blows out a ring of smoke. The way she owns the space around her with such unapologetic self-possession makes her seem like royalty in your eyes.

"I've heard more convincing accents from Mr. Zhang's whores. You might be able to fool the Burgesses, but not us."

You snort. She gets right to the point, you'll giver her that. "Who are you?"

The woman stubs her cigarette out on the bar counter. "The real question is, who are you to my son?"

You blink. This is Polly Gray–the Shelby matriarch and second-in-command. Michael's mother. You can see the resemblance now. It's in the eyes, although they are a different color.

"You should ask him that, Mrs. Gray. I'm not privy to your son's thoughts and feelings." Not anymore.

Her painted lips purse. "But I'm asking you. And I'm not in the habit of repeating myself."

You cast your eyes down, sliding your thumb through the condensation that's gathered on the glass. "I'm no one to him."

Polly shakes her head. "Not the way he looks at you,” she says. “You knew him before, didn't you? When he was with the other family? When he was still Henry."

You see no point in lying or denying it. "I met him when we were both in the care of the nuns at St. Hilda’s. We haven't seen each other in years. We're little more than strangers now. Is that what you wanted to hear?"

Polly considers you for a moment. "I have a nose for trouble, girl, and you reek of it. Go back to America. And stay away from Michael."

With that, she stands up and sashays away, leaving you at the bar, stunned, and with your head spinning.

_What the hell just happened?_

The room suddenly feels too damn small. You shouldn't have come here tonight. You have to get away from the party. Clear your head. Powder your nose.

The crowd thins out as you make your way toward the imposing wooden staircase in the foyer. The noise falls away as you climb those steps, and reach the landing. Hunting trophies and portraits of Tommy Shelby, his wife, and rosy-cheeked baby son line the silk-papered walls. Shelby’s painted eyes, just as piercing and unsettlingly direct as they are in real life, seem to follow you as you quickly walk past and duck into the first room to your right.

It's a study or a private library of sorts with dark, heavy teak furniture. Expensive but old-fashioned.

You freeze on the threshold, hand curled around the doorknob. The lights are low, but they don't hide the two bodies rutting hard and fast against one of the bookshelves. If not for the unmistakable visual, the breathy moans, low grunts, the rustle of clothes, and the rhythmic thuds of a body being repeatedly slammed against the wall, make it rather obvious what they're doing.

The man's broad-shouldered back faces you, lean muscle flexing beneath the untucked white shirt as he fucks into the gasping woman. You’re about to make your exit to afford the young couple some privacy when the woman lifts her head from the man's shoulder and her big, brown fawn eyes lock with yours.

It's the girl from dinner, the one that sat next to–your stomach dips.

Eyes going wide at being discovered, she makes a squawking sound and tries to untangle herself from the panting man. "Stop, stop! Let me down." She pushes against his chest and pulls up her dress to cover her tits.

The man–you already know who it is–looks over his shoulder with a frown, a sweaty lock of dark hair falling into his eyes.

Breathing hard, Michael stares at you, his expression blank and inscrutable.

You hate that it feels like your whole god damn chest has caved in.

In that moment, somewhere on the grounds, a gun goes off, shattering tonight's fragile peace.

The woman yelps. "What was that?"

You're no longer rooted to the spot. Spinning on your heels, you storm from the room and you don't stop until your halfway down the stairs.

Nausea clogs the back of your throat. Your mind races.

Someone has been shot. Who? Michael fucked someone else. Why? These thoughts circle and chase each other and light a fire in your head.

_Snap out of it, Y/N, will you?_

Michael can sleep with whoever he wants, you tell yourself. He owes you nothing, certainly not his faithfulness.

A hand grabs you and pulls you into a hard, muscled chest. Body memory has you reaching for the clever, little revolver holstered to your outer thigh under the dress, ready to shoot the prick's balls off.

"What has you in such a hurry, baby?" Harvey purrs. You stiffen as his hands settle on your hips, thumbs stroking your hip bones. "Did you hear that bang?"

"Sounded like a gunshot." Your arms hug your middle to put some distance between you and him. "Don't be scared, baby. It's nothing. Probably just a car engine," he coos and it sets your teeth on edge, how he treats you like a fucking child.

It's only then that you notice the state of his face. "What happened to you?" You touch the red, wet smear along his forehead. His nose is bloody too.

Harvey shrugs lightly and puffs out his chest. "Just a friendly fight between former brothers-in-arms. I guess things got a little rough. Happens when a man's blood is up."

"You were fighting? Who?"

"Leave it, Celia." There's a terse edge to his voice despite his indulgent smile. "You look tired. It's the country air. I'll have them bring around the car." Harvey drops a kiss on your head. As he strides off in search of the house staff, you notice that he's limping.

* * *

You smell the fire before you see it. Charred meat. Burning hair. It makes you want to gag.

They built a pyre on the sprawling grounds behind the house. Standing on the small balcony, you watch as the flames belch smoke into the night sky. You take a deep drag of your cigarette and the shiver that ripples down your back has nothing to do with the dropping temperatures. You're not a big smoker, but tonight your body is screaming for a nicotine fix.

"May I join you?" A rough, male voice asks.

You want to say no, but Tommy Shelby doesn't wait for anyone's permission. He steps outside, and lights himself a cigarette.

The two of you stand in silence for a while, several feet apart, with only the sound of tires crunching over gravel, as cars pull out of the driveway, between you.

You tap the cigarette with your finger, letting the excess ash fall to the ground. "One of yours or one of theirs?" You ask.

The fire reflects in Shelby's eyes like twin flames. He makes you wait for his answer. "Neither."

"I hope for your sake that that fire burns hot enough. The flames don't take care of everything." You would know.

"I can assure you, my men are thorough," he says.

You nod. In the distance, you can see Harvey by the Rolls Royce, waiting for you. You know what he'll ask next.

"Does Harvey Routledge have any idea what you are, Miss Y/L/N?"

"And what am I, Mr. Shelby? Don't leave me in such suspense."

"A thief, a con woman. A murderer." He notices the way your shoulders lock up. "It bothers you–the word–doesn’t it?" He muses and cocks his head.

"May I ask how you've come to these conclusions about me?"

"Everyone on the guest list was extensively security vetted. Celia Bodine doesn’t exist. I also recognized you from Sabini’s club. Imagine my surprise when I saw you sitting at my dinner table, on the arm of my wife's dearest cousin of all people."

"So, what are you going to do about it?"

"I’m going to offer you a job."

You scoff. When he doesn't react, only calmly takes another puff on his cigarette, you realize he's not joking.

"I'm a reformed woman, Mr. Shelby. I don't do these things anymore. I don't have to."

"Few of us do. We keep doing it because we've been doing it for so long, we don't know how to stop. Because we need the noise. Because we're afraid of what we might hear in its absence."

He flicks his cigarette over the stone railing and turns to go back inside. "Come to Small Heath when you've had enough of being honest." His footsteps halt. "Oh, and one more thing–I expect all of my wife's relatives to have their valuables back by the end of the night."

"Goodnight, Mr. Shelby," you say, fighting a smile as his footsteps retreat.

You don't finish the cigarette.

* * *

The next morning, Harvey comes up from the hotel lobby to your suite at the Midland Hotel to inform you that you'll have to leave now if you want to make the nine o'clock train to Liverpool.

He returns to find all the clothes you took with you from America neatly stowed in your valise, your scent lingering on cold, unmade sheets and an envelope deposited on the bedside table, containing $90. A dollar for every day he wasted on you.

This is the day Harvey Routledge learns to never trust a thief.


	5. Chapter 5

If the devil had an address, you're pretty sure he would set up shop on Watery Lane, Small Heath, Birmingham. Which isn't too far from the truth, considering what Tommy Shelby has been up to since his wife died.

Turning up the collar of your coat, you cross the street and try not to breathe too deeply.

Blood and machine oil swirl in the ditchwater pooling in the potholes on the street, while barefoot, feral-looking children chase skinny mutts through the mud with sticks.

You've never seen so much horseshit and grime in one place. It looks almost biblical, like fucking Gehenna. A smoking, sulfurous pit.

"Oi! Careful, miss." An older fellow grabs your coat sleeve and hauls you back as a blast of flames bursts like hell fire from a furnace in one of the workshops. The blistering heat of it scalds your face, but the man’s quick intervention saves you from being incinerated on the spot. Just another heap of ash.

"You're not from here." The man squints at your long red coat, polished boots, and clean hair and face.

"Is it that obvious?" You give a quavery laugh, the scare from a few moments ago still sitting in your bones.

"Afraid so, miss." He grins and tips his cap to you. "Name's Johnny Dogs, at your service."

"Y/N Y/L/N. Pleased to meet you. Thank you for your help just now."

"Are you looking for someone? Maybe little ol' me can help with that, eh?" He wriggles his thick eyebrows.

"I have an appointment with Tommy Shelby. That name ring any bells for you?"

He clears his throat. "What business does a respectable, young lady like you have–argh, I won't ask. Come along." Waving his hand, he sets off down Watery Lane. "And watch out for the–"

Your boots squelch as you plow through the dirt, unbothered by the sprinkles of mud spraying on your coat. "Believe me, I'm not respectable or a lady."

Johnny Dogs leads you to a sorry-looking, nondescript Victoria terrace with boarded windows. There are no flaunting displays of wealth, no grand proclamation that this is Tommy Shelby's seat of power from which he rules his growing empire.

"Here we are," Johnny announces and hooks his thumbs in the pockets of his woolen jacket. "You go right in, miss."

Giving him a grateful smile, you enter the shop. You've been to gambling dens and betting shops in London and New York, but never one so out in the open and in full sight of the coppers. You wonder how much he pays to keep them off his back.

The smoke on the streets has found its way inside the shop. Men and a few women are working on tables and desks, answering the shrill ring of the telephone, counting money and chips, and chalking the huge blackboard at the back of the room with bets and odds.

The door falls shut behind you. The clacking of the typewriters and buzz of conversation fall away. Even the phone stops ringing for a moment.

The message is pretty clear. You're the intruder.

You swallow hard and take another step into the room. "I'm here to see Thomas Shelby."

A young, pregnant woman with coal-rimmed nut-brown eyes and self-made, beaded jewelry waddles over to you. "What business?" .

"None of yours." You meet her guarded gaze. "I'd appreciate it if you tell him I'm here."

"I'm not his bloody secretary." She crosses her arms over her rounded middle.

"No need, thank you, Esme." The man himself walks out of one of the offices, smoke in hand. He goes to shakes your hand.

"Miss Y/L/N, I didn't expect you to stay away for so long. I was beginning to think you'd never show."

"You and me both," you admit with a slight grin. "I bet that doesn't happen a lot to you these days. Being kept waiting."

"You could say that." He puts the cigarette between his teeth and motions for you to follow him.

The telephone rings.

"What are you all looking at, eh? Get back to fucking work." He calls over his shoulder as he pushes open his office door.

"Take a seat." He says as he rounds his massive mahogany desk.

"Um." You stop in your tracks, at a loss.

The leather chair in front of the desk is already occupied by the next to youngest Shelby brother. John, was it? In fact, you're far from the only ones in the room. Polly Gray, Arthur Shelby, and Michael are all gathered around the desk, staring at you with varying degrees of hostility. A small coil of anxiety twists behind your naval. The last time you saw Michael, he was fucking that girl.The memory stings for reasons you don't care to examine.

"Up, John. Let her fucking sit."

John winks at you as he lifts himself out of the chair. Straightening your shoulders, you hold your head high, trying to look as unaffected and imperious as possible as you sink into the chair John just vacated.

You cross your legs under the table. The urge to look at Michael is making your hands restless.

"Aren't you going to offer me something to drink, Mr. Shelby?" At the very least, that will give your hands something to do.

Wordless, he puts a glass and a bottle of single malt in front of you, and starts pouring the whiskey.

"What's this, Tom? Since when are we bringing strangers to the shop?" Polly Gray demands, bracing her hands on her hips, formidable as ever. "She shouldn't be here."

"I agree," Michael says tightly. You glare at him over the rim of the whiskey glass. He can be such a stubborn ass. At least, that hasn't changed.

In the meantime, Tommy has pulled a thick folder from the desk drawer, and flips it open. You can read your name on one of the files. "Your objections have been noted, Pol, Michael, but seeing as I'm still the the head of this company, I'm electing to ignore them." He turns to you, holding up the folder. "Recognize this?"

You knock back the rest of your whiskey before you answer. "Nothing a little palm greasing can't get you, is there?"

"Not much." He starts reading directly from your file. "Y/N Y/L/N. Female. Twenty years old. Born at St. Hilda’s Home for Children in Stafford. First arrest in 1917 for pick-pocketing. The next years are more of the same: petty theft, disorderly conduct, breaking and entering, trespassing..."

You feel strangely detached as he recites your criminal past to the room, as if the girl who did these things isn't really you.

"Wanted for arson and the murder of a Mr. Jack Teach, a Mr. George Barrowman, and a Mr. Edward Fawley, all workers at the same factory in Wolverhampton. No arrest has ever been made because, for years, the police were unable to locate the prime suspect, Miss Y/L/N here."

One of the Shelby brothers–John or Arthur–lets out a low whistle.

"Christ," Polly whispers under her breath.

You can't bring yourself to look at Michael's reaction. You've both changed. But there are things he doesn't know yet...will never know if you can help it.

Tommy drops the folder to the desk. There's no judgement in his eyes, but no pity either. "This happened in 1920. That put you around–"

"Sixteen," you say calmly. "I was sixteen."

"And you were never caught."

You shrug. "They checked the trains coming into London but not the boats. Might have been one of yours. The boatman found me hiding in one of the crates but the old sod was too soft to throw me overboard. Got me all the way to Limehouse Cut before three Titanic boys robbed him blind and chucked his crates into the Thames. Cut his throat and dumped him in the river too for sport."

Tommy takes out another file and slides it across the desk. "But that wasn't the end of it for you, no? Only the start of a very ambitious career. Not long after you arrived in London, a series of highly publicized burglaries began. Private homes in Mayfair, Kensington and Belgravia, department stores like Selfridges and Harrods. All these burglaries were ascribed to the same individual–the Black Cat kept the toffs on their toes for months, until one day, they simply vanished. I always wondered, though, why the name?"

You scoff. "The newspapers started it." You fling the folder back on his side of the desk, and pour yourself another inch of whiskey. "Is that why you wanted me here, to congratulate me on my criminal record? You know who I am, what I'm capable of doing. Now, the way I see it, you're going to tell me what you want me to do for you. And what you're willing to pay for it."

"How does five thousand pounds sound to you?"

"Like hell," Polly snaps. "She's a child, Thomas. For all we know she could be in the pocket of the Italians."

"I wouldn't worry too much about that,” you drawl. “Sabini and I didn't part on the best of terms.”

"I'm serious, Thomas, don't get her involved."

"We need good people for this, Pol. She's in."

"Fuck off, Tommy." Michael pushes away from the wall and storms out of the room in a huff, banging the door on his way out.

Flashing you a final, hard look, Polly follows her son.

A tightness grows in your throat.

You don't understand why Michael is acting like he can't stand to be in the same room as you. There’s always been that anger in him, even as a boy. He seems to have gotten better at hiding it, but you can tell it's still there underneath that posh suit and slick manners. His angers has just never been directed at you before.

"We'll deal with him." Tommy says. "Well, Miss Y/L/N–"

"Call me Y/N."

"Y/N." Reaching under the desk, he pulls out a piece of bunched tweed. It's a flat cap, like those his brothers and the men outside that door are wearing. "What do you say?"

"Just so we’re clear, I'm not going to fuck anyone for you," you say bluntly.

"And I won't ask you to."

You take the cap, turn it over in your hands. It even has the razor stitched into the peak. "What do you need me to do?"

"You speak any Russian?"

"Depends on how drunk you get me," you quip, which makes John and Arthur chuckle. “But I’m a fast learner.”

+++++++++++++

Tommy asked his secretary, Lizzie, to show you to your new accommodations, a hollowed out terrace not far from the Shelby's betting shop, a little further down Watery Lane.

"Thank you for letting me stay with you," you tell her as you climb the creaking staircase, dust motes glinting like embers in the lamplight.

"It isn't much," Lizzie warns you. "But it's clean and it has running water so that puts it one up on my old flat–careful that one's loose–anyways," she says, skipping the indicated step. "Rent is due on the first Tuesday of the month. We share a kitchen and a bathroom. Don't use up all the hot water in mornings. And if you bring over male company, please, for the love of god, keep it down."

The flat is small, but Lizzie went out of her way to make it look cozy and lived in with white doilies, patchwork blankets, and small bouquets of dried wildflowers.

She looks almost nervous as she watches you inspect her space, fiddling with the little ribbon on her cloche hat.

"Looks nice," you say to reassure her, then your eyes widen with child-like excitement. "You have a radio!"

"Yes, it was a birthday present from Mr. Shelby."

"That was very generous of him," you remark slyly.

Lizzie's cheeks flush. "Well, that's Tommy for you. Come, your room is down the hallway. Sarah, the girl who lived here before you, got herself in the family way, so, she married the git who got her pregnant and moved to Moseley with him." She opens the door to your room. "Like I said it, isn't much."

Your new bedroom is half the size of Tommy's office. The floral wallpaper is peeling slightly. A single bed with a brass frame is pushed into a corner and a wooden crucifix hangs from a nail above the headboard. The rest of the meager space is taken up by a rickety closet and a chair with a snapped leg, holding a cracked porcelain jug and a basin for a quick wash in the morning or before bed.

You turn your head to smile at her. "It's super. Thank you, Lizzie."

She nods. "We girls have to look out for each other in a place like this, right? I'm gonna leave you to unpack now."

Dropping your bags, you flop down on the bed as soon as the door clicks shut, the rusty bed springs squeaking under your weight. A spider scuttles across the ceiling.

You slip your hand into your coat pocket and withdraw the folded piece of paper Tommy pressed into your hand before you left his office. Written on it are only two things–a name and an address:

_Connor Nutley. Lanchester Motor Company, 6 Norton Road, Hay Mills, Birmingham_

++++++++

"Two children–no, three! Two strong boys and a pretty girl," Esme announces confidently as she traces the lines on your upturned palm with a concentrated pout.

"My, I certainly do keep busy, don't I?" You laugh.

"Better start catching up on sleep now, because you won't be getting any with three little devils yapping at your heel."

You've just returned from paying Connor Nutley a visit, the keys to Bay 6 jingling in the inner pocket of the woolen gray jacket you've donned to blend in with the other factory workers.

You and Esme are leaning over the table in the Shelby parlor's small kitchen while you wait for Tommy to come in. Heads stuck together, the two of you are giggling like a couple of school girls. Esme quickly warmed up to you when you complimented her self-made necklaces and bracelets and she even offered to teach you how to make your own.

"What does this line mean?" You point at the distinct, horizontal line ending below your middle finger.

"That's the love line. It reveals matters of the heart," Esme explains and takes your hand in hers. "Let's see.... You have a great love in your future and in your past. He's not far away. It may be someone you know." She grins. "I heard that, last night, Johnny Dogs told everyone at the Garrison about how he saved you from the furnace. He's not bad looking for a man his age–"

"Leave it out," you groan, rolling your eyes.

"I'll have you know; I was quite the matchmaker before I married John. I have a cousin in Nechells who is in need of a beautiful wife."

"Telling fortunes again, Esme?" The Blinder who just swaggered into the kitchen asks. He’s tall and handsome. You recognize him from the wedding. Michael's friend.

"You're next, Siah," Esme promises darkly. "Man up, palm on table."

"Nah, not falling for that again, woman. Didn't Tommy ban you from bothering people in the shop with your witchcraft?"

"It's not witchcraft," she protests. Suddenly, an idea seems to pop into her head and her dark gaze turns shrewd. "Isaiah? Have you met Y/N? She's working for the Blinders now."

Isaiah does a slow double-take on your pants-clad body from the waist down, then gives an appreciative whistle. "Bloody hell–sorry da–we got ourselves a Peaky Girl. That's a first. No offense, but I thought you were a bloke for a moment there."

You snort a laugh. "No bloke," you confirm and lift your cap. "And none taken."

"I remember you from the boss' wedding. You were there with that newspaper yank." A knowing look enters his eyes. "You're the one who's got Mickey so riled up."

"Mickey?" Your brows shoot toward the peak of your cap. Henry used to despise nicknames. Things change.

"Yeah, my man, Michael." Isaiah scratches the back of his head. "So, were you two ever...? He threatened to shoot off my bollocks when I asked."

"What? No, never," you say, shaking your head maybe a little too forcefully.

Amused, Esme looks between the two of you, her chin propped on her hand. "Isn't today pay day for you and the boys? Why don't you take Y/N out to the Garrison? There's music and dancing on Friday nights."

Raking a hand through his short, cropped hair, he flashes you a cocky smile. "I'm off the clock early tonight. What do you say, love? Fancy a dance?"

"Are you offering to buy me a drink?"

"For a pretty girl like you? Always."

He's a charmer, this one, but relatively harmless compared to the company you used to keep. You see no reason to refuse him.

Isaiah is handsome, and fun, and you find yourself missing the glitz and glamor of the bohemian, hedonistic lifestyle you lead back in New York. Dancing the night away in the Astoria Hotel's Louis XIV style ballroom. The smokescreen of jazz clubs in Harlem. Driving down to Sandy Point–Harvey's Long Island house–on the weekends.

Calling it a date, you give Isaiah the address to your flat and he agrees to pick you up at eight o'clock.

Esme looks very pleased with herself when you and Isaiah leave the kitchen, shoulder to shoulder, having caught sight of Tommy's parked Bugatti through the window. You can only imagine how well she'd do as a matchmaking mama in high society. New York's nouveau riche upper crust would run out of eligible bachelors and her brood would be married to wall street tycoons and heiresses before the end of the year.

As you make for Tommy's office, the door to Michael's office swings open and a rumpled girl, wearing four-inch heels and a fur-lined hat, scampers out, followed by a decidedly unruffled Michael. For all his nonchalance and impeccable outward appearance, the two of them could have played a game of bridge in there.

 _Not bloody likely._ Your head hurts.

The girl's eyes dart to you, going round as saucers. A squeaky, "oh god," escapes her, before she quickly covers her mouth with a gloved hand. If she's so concerned about being found out, they should stop shagging in public places, the mean little voice in your head snarks.

"Mickey, Charlotte," Isaiah greets his friends with a conspirator's grin.

Michael stops in his tracks as he sees you and him together. Then his gaze drops lower and the corners of his mouth curve down. "What are those?"

You roll your eyes. "They're called trousers. You should know. You're wearing them too."

He doesn't let you off the hook that easily. "Why are you dressed like that?"

"Like what?" You challenge him, curling your thumbs in the belt loops.

"Like fucking Johnny Dogs."

An exasperated snort bursts from you. "Don't be such a git, Michael, it's 1924. The Victorians are dead, and women have rights now."

"I think they look brilliant. I heard all the women in Paris are wearing them. They even smoke cigars," Charlotte says in a show of female solidarity and you can feel the ugliness, that stirred in your chest when you first saw, her bleed from your bones like venom from a snake's tooth.

"See, your girlfriend is a progressive."

A muscle in Michael's jaw jumps. "Jesus, she's not my girl–"

He's interrupted by Tommy's arrival. The leader of the Peaky Blinders blazes past you, smelling of opium and enough gin to put a fucking horse to sleep. "Morning, Michael, Isaiah. Miss Murray, does your father know you're here?"

"Ye–um–No, Mr. Shelby," she stutters, twisting the purple suede of her gloves around her fingers.

"Better get back to him, eh?" He snaps his fingers at you. "Y/N, with me. Isaiah, go look for Finn, and when you find him, send him to my office, please."

"Sure thing, Tom." Isaiah turns to you before he leaves in search of the youngest Shelby. "I'll see you tonight, love.”

When he's gone, Michael frowns, the vein above his brow straining. "What's tonight?" You half-resent how he sounds like he cares.

"Oh, Isaiah's asked me out," you say lightly. "To the Garrison."

"He asked you?" He looks like he has trouble processing the information. "And you said yes."

You cock your hip, arms crossing over your chest. "Yeah, I did, and why the fuck not? He's been the perfect gentleman, which is more than can be said for others.” You dare him to say something, but Michael only lights a cigarette, looking like a right sour arse.

Urgh, men. Why show emotion when you can smoke broodily? You're starting to think it's a Peaky Blinders mandatory requirement.

"Well," you say, body folding away from them. "It was good meeting you. Again."

Charlotte cringes at the reminder, but musters a pearly white debutante smile. "You too."

You're halfway through Tommy's door, when you turn around, and face them one more time. "Oh, and Charlotte–you've got Snow on your nose.”

++++++++++++

It's a good thing that you have long legs like Lizzie or the tasseled hem of the dress she loaned you for tonight would sweep the floors. It's black, sleeveless, and beaded with glistening sequins.

Harvey would have hated it, called it tacky and cheap, which is reason enough for you to love it. Adjusting the rhinestone headband over your brow, you give a twirl in front of the fogged bathroom mirror.

"Damn, it looks way better on you than it does on me." Lizzie sighs from the door. "To be twenty again."

"Come off it, you're still young and gorgeous, Lizzie, not some doddery, dried up spinster." You laugh as you rub a small, wet brush through the black cake pot, and put the finishing touches on your lashes.

"I don't feel like it," she retorts, more to herself than you. Peeling herself from the door, she joins you in the tiny, cramped space of the bathroom. "You enjoy yourself tonight. Isaiah Jesus is a good one. I'm friends with his father, and he raised him well. He'll treat you right. Still–" She shows you what's behind her back. A pocket pistol the size of a child's closed fist. She holds it out to you. "A girl can never be too safe."

"I couldn't agree more." Instead of taking the gun, you lift the dress and roll down your raylon stockings just enough to let her see the long, pearl-handled revolver strapped to your thigh.

"I see you can handle yourself just fine."

You drop the hem of your dress. "Been doing it for a very long time."

Lizzie's face softens as she considers you for a moment. "You've been through a lot, haven't you?" You both know it's not a question. Life hasn't been kind to either of you and there's a certain kinship in that.

"Don't come back too late. Mrs. Bates has ears like a bat."

"The landlady?"

"The woman has had nothing to occupy herself since the war other than to pry into other people's business. She’s always lying in wait behind the curtains. I'll stay up until your home."

"You don't have to do that, Lizzie. It's all right," you protest, but the older woman is having none of it.

"It's for my own peace of mind." She peers outside through the lace-trimmed curtains. "Get your purse. It's almost eight."

In the streets, a car honks twice.

"That will be him."

With a last look in the mirror, you turn to her and strike a ridiculous pose. "How do I look?"

"Go, go, go." Laughing, Lizzie takes you by the shoulders and steers you toward the door. "Don't make the him wait. The poor boy is probably sweating through his suit."

"Yes, mum." You slip your dancing shoes on and dash down the squeaking stairs, your purse flying behind you.

Isaiah parked the Ford Model–quite obviously borrowed from his Da to impress you–in front of the house. His arm is slung casually over the empty passenger seat as you slide in beside him.

"Wow," is all he can say when he sees you. "I must be the luckiest bloke in all of bloody Birmingham."

On the short drive from your apartment to the Garrison, you discover that you share a love for jazz music from overseas. You like him. He's charming, easy to talk to, and he knows how to give a girl a good time. There's no doubt in your mind that it's going to be a good night–until you see who's waiting for you in front of the pub.

"You didn't mention that they would be here too." You don't bother to lower your voice.

"It's a double date," Charlotte says as she hangs from Michael's arm, perkier than she was this morning. The apples of her cheeks are flushed from the cold and whiskey. "It was Michael's idea."

"Was it? Isn't that grand." The sarcasm chafes your tongue.

Why are you doing this, Henry?

Michael's face gives nothing away as he crushes the cigarette under the heel of his polished Italian shoe. "Let's just go inside," he says roughly. "I'm fuckin' freezing."

"Did you bring the cocaine, Siah?" Charlotte asks anxiously, licking her painted lips.

"Let a man breathe. You can play in the snow later." Grinning, Isaiah pats the pocket of his waistcoat and puts his arm around your shoulders, oblivious to the mounting tension between you and Michael.

You have a bad feeling about this. Still, you let Isaiah pull you inside, and through the second interior door, into the warm bubble of raucous laughter, liquor and music.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cw for pretty graphic violence/death, and vomiting toward the end of the chapter

The Peaky Blinders aren't the only ones flocking to the Garrison for a drink on payday.Factory workers and paper pushers from the BSA offices, disgruntled regulars, and packs of young women getting their kicks in Birmingham’s dregs. All of them are drawn to the pub like moths to a flame of burning liquor.

"...in front of everyone at the pictures! Who does that in public?" A very high, very drunk Charlotte is telling you about something that happened to her and her sister at the pictures last week, snorting lines of white powder from the table with a £50 note Michael handed her at the beginning of the evening.

Isaiah returns to your booth with another round of drinks, saving you.

"For the ladies." He puts two glasses with schnapps and rum in front of you. You snatch Charlotte's glass before she can reach for it, grabbing on to your arm instead. She's a clumsy drunk.

"I think she's had enough," you say and knock it back yourself. Tommy must keep all the good stuff for himself or exports because the swill they serve here tastes like rotting water. It curdles your stomach, but the pleasant, warm buzz it leaves in your bloodstream is a welcome one.

"You've been to America, Y/N, yes? What's New York like? Is it very exciting? Very different from London?" Charlotte slurs, her eyes shiny with the effects of the cocaine.

You think for a second, feeling Michael's gaze on you as his thumb plays with the chain of his pocket watch.

"It's bigger. You can't see the sky for all the chimneys and high-rise buildings. It's dirty and loud and mayhem. Stinks just the same as London. But there's freedom there. I guess, in that way, it's not so different from Small Heath."

Charlotte makes a disgusted face. "Birmingham is so ugly. Too much smoke and everywhere you go it smells like coal." She shudders.

"I've got family in Baltimore on my mum's side," Isaiah chimes in. "Might join them over there when I've saved up enough dosh."

"Are you allowed to do that? Just leave?" You ask. "Here I was thinking being a Peaky Boy was for life, however short-lived that may be."

Isaiah shrugs. "Nah, I go wherever I want, love. Mickey and I got big plans for the future, right, mate?"

Michael holds your gaze, ignoring Charlotte who is kissing up his neck. "Right."

You have no doubt of that. Henry was always destined for better, greater things. A bright, ambitious future. Right from the start, he was bound to outgrow the peaceful, quiet cottage by the sea you spoke of as children. Probably would have blown it to pieces before he reached age twenty-six just to hear some noise. In that way you understood him. Peace was never an option for you.

Fed up with the sight of Charlotte being all over Michael, you shoot to your feet, rattling the table with your abrupt movement. "I'm bored. Come, Siah. Let me show you how girls dance in New York."

You pull him from the booth. A large gramophone is playing The Charleston in a corner.

It doesn't take long for you to catch on that Isaiah is an amazing dancer himself. Arms and legs moving to the rhythm of the music, he dips and flips you around, never missing a beat.

After a few songs, you're both laughing and getting bolder. His hands are drifting from your back to your hips. And then he's kissing you.

Isaiah's kisses are like him–playful, flirtatious, only half serious. _Fun_. Snogging him is fun. Not a life-altering experience that has you forget everything around you, but you lock your hands behind his neck and open your mouth to him, nonetheless, grazing his full bottom lip with your teeth. Isaiah pulls you closer and deepens the kiss.

"Oi, put it away," you hear the man at the bar bellow. "This is a fucking respectable establishment, you hear me? Young people, running wild these days. Wait until your da hears about this, Isaiah Jesus."

With a breathless giggle, you break the kiss and make a rude gesture at the blustering bartender.

"You wanna go somewhere quiet, love?" Isaiah whispers with a playful nip to your lip. "My da's home working on a sermon, so..."

You open your mouth to reply when you notice a man standing at the bar from the corner of your eye. Even though his face is angled away from you, you can't shake the feeling that you're being watched.

He's wearing a black coat over clergy robes and a dark hat with a broad brim, casting the face beneath in shadows. Smoke curls from the cigarette he's puffing and, for a second, the flare of the stub illuminates his profile. Oily, slicked back hair and sallow yet deceptively harmless features. The joy and lightness you felt dancing and kissing Isaiah dies, and you can feel the color draining from your face.

_"No."_

The priest smiles and raises his glass to you.

 _Please, no, please, no, please_ –You have to throw up. 

"Do you know him?" Isaiah asks, his hand still on your cheek.

You twist your body away. Your bones feel brittle. Small. "No."

"Is he bothering you? Want me to go over there and tell him to fuck off?" He's already moving in the priest's direction.

Panicking, you grab his collar, knuckles turning white as they push against your skin. "No, Isaiah, don't! He's dangerous."

He frowns. "So, you do know him."

"I–" Shaking, you look over your shoulder, but the priest is gone. Vanished into thin air like a ghost of your past. The pint on the bar counter the only sign of his presence.

"I can't be here right now. I'm sorry." You shoulder past him, knocking into a dancing couple as you stagger back to the booth. Like a fucking hunted animal. You just want to get your purse and get the hell out of here. No, what you really want is Henry. _I need Henry._

Michael sits alone in the booth, brooding. His face darkens further when he sees your haunted expression; the fear in your eyes. "What happened? Did he try something?" He chucks his cigarette case on the table as he makes to stand. "I'm going to fucking kill Isaiah."

"Not him." You shake your head, the name stuck in your throat. Your tongue feels like something died on there. "Hu...Hughes."

He goes very still. His mouth opens, then closes. The effect that name has on him is more subdued but you know there's a storm of emotions–fear, disgust, shame, rage–building inside him.

"Michael, are you still paying attention to me?" Charlotte whines, her head popping up from under the table, lips shiny with spit, her lipstick smeared messily around her mouth.

The bile in the back of your throat surges up. That's it. You've seen enough.

Stomach in tight knots, you snatch your small beaded handbag from the bench. Not looking back as he calls after you, you make for the pub's glass interior doors when a group of five men, wearing homburg hats and gray trenchcoats, prowls through the first set of doors and busts through the second one.

You back up instinctively.

They're dressed for battle.

"Buona sera, gentlemen," the tallest of the group shouts and raps a table with his cane three times like a grand marshal, a smarmy smile splitting his cheeks. "And ladies," he adds, leering at you. He looks like a mad bulldog.

"Oi, fuck off! No wops allowed in this place," the bar tender warns.

"Such poor manners." The man with the cane clucks his tongue regretfully. "Antonio, Vito, please."

Two of the men behind him break away from the group.They're holding metal bats.

The music cuts off with an awful scratching sound as the gramophone is smashed to a pulp of bent metal and wood under the bat. The other man swings his bat at the barkeep's head with a sickly, wet thud, and then at the shelf above the bar.

Bottles shatter. People scream, and make a run for the door as the two continue to trash the place. The bartender's brains leak out onto the floorboards, his skull dented in like an old, rotten apple.

"Now that I have everybody's attention," the man with the cane says in a reasonable voice. "Are there any Peaky fucking Blinders here tonight? Any Shelbys?"

Your hand curls around the grip of your revolver, ready to draw in case the situation escalates further than it already has.

"Who's asking?" Shite, of course he couldn't keep his mouth shut. Your heart sinks as the crowd parts around Isaiah, who swaggers up to the Italians, bladed cap crushed in his fist.

The man licks his wormy lips. "You're not a Shelby."

"We speak for the Peaky Blinders." Michael appears at Isaiah's side, all business and hard, cold edges. "What do you want?"

"I heard about you. You're the bookkeeper in your cousin's little operation." The Italian gets into Michael's face.

"Careful now." You draw your gun, cocking and aiming it at the man's head. So much for conflict de-escalation.

Michael says your name in warning, lifting a placating hand, but his jaw is clenched as he stares down the man in front of him. "Leave right now and no one has to get killed."

Propping his cane on his shoulder, the man laughs derisively. "This is all the Peaky Blinders has to offer? A bunch of milksops playing at being businessmen and gobby whores? Very well. Tommy Shelby killed Vincente. Put a bullet in his head and sent what was left of him to London in a fucking whiskey crate. Now, to us, the Changrettas are family. You know about kin, don't you, boy? The bonds of blood. _Famiglia è tutto_. Know what that means?" He points a finger at Michael. 'It means you don't get to fuck with us without suffering the fucking consequences. It means we get to put you and your girl here into the fucking ground–" His head snaps up and his jaw audibly dislocates as Michael's fist crashes into it.

Within seconds, the Garrison turns into a full-blown war zone. Chairs are broken over people's heads. Windows are getting smashed in with blunt objects or people's faces.

Blood drips from Isaiah's cap as he cuts one of the men a red smile, while Michael has another man pinned to to ground with his knee, beating the shit out of his face.

A man attacks you, swinging a bottle with a broken neck, it's cracked, serrated edges sharper than any shiv. You slam him face-first into the table strewn with shot glasses. The man howls, clawing at the jagged shard sticking out his eyeball. The tangy copper scent of blood and violence permeate the air.

The man with the cane stirs on the ground. Leaning on his aid, he spits out a tooth and blood as he gets to his feet and draws a long, hidden blade from his cane. Even worse, he has his sights set on you.

You only have a moment to point your gun and pull the trigger. The kickback reverberates painfully through your bones. The bullet goes through his chest, but it doesn't stop his advance, only slows him down.

Heart racing, you squeeze the trigger again, but the chamber is empty.

"You're dead, bitch," he hisses through pain-clenched teeth.

The bullet enters the side of his head and comes out bloody on the other side, hitting the cabinet behind him. The man collapses forward, dead, in a pool of his own blood. With the leader down, the others–at least those who are still capable of running–flee the pub.

You whip around, looking for the shooter, who's standing behind the bar, armed with a shotgun. He's on the older side of fifty. Lanky with bushels thinning fair hair sticking out from under his cap. "What in under God happened here?" He booms as he steps over the dead bartender as if he's a piece of furniture.

"Was nothing we could've done, Charlie. They were out for our blood," Isaiah says. He has a bleeding cut on his cheek.

You nudge the man at your feet with the tip of your shoe to get a better look at his face. "Those were Sabini's thugs," you say. "I recognize him from the Eden Club. Never left Sabini's side. He called him Sonny. You must have really pissed him off for him to send his personal bodyguard."

The man–Charlie–spits on Sonny's dead body. "Fooking hell, I told Tommy his vendetta against Changretta would bring down holy hell upon us."

"Why did Tommy kill this Mr. Changretta?" You ask.

"He took something from him," Charlie replies gruffly.

"And it's not a good idea to take from Tommy Shelby, I understand." It doesn't take a genius to figure out that the something in this case is a someone. The Changrettas are responsible for Grace's death, and they've paid for it dearly.

A shrill scream rips through the pub.

"It's safe, Charlotte. You can come out." Michael squats down in front of a table. His hair is a mess, his tie hangs torn and loose around his neck, and his knuckles are bleeding and raw, but other than that, he looks unharmed.

"Is he dead? Oh my God, he's dead, isn't he? You killed him," Charlotte shrieks. She's cowering under the table, her pretty face pale under the makeup. "Who are you people?"

"You knew what my family does," Michael says impatiently.

"I thought so too, but you're not gangsters. You're animals," she yells. "Don't touch me. Don't–" She shrinks away from him, staring at the bloodstains on his shirt with nothing short of terror. The poor girl has probably never seen violence like this before. It's hard to imagine what that's like. Being innocent.

"I want to go home," she demands.

Charlie puts the shotgun on the table. "For Christ's sake, Michael, get the girl out of here. And you." He turns to Isaiah. "Get Tommy."

Isaiah nods. His gaze moves to you and there's something apologetic in it. "This wasn't the date I was expecting."

"Yeah, me neither." When he hesitates, you add, "go, I'll be alright," with a half heartened smile.

Charlie started sweeping up the broken glass by the time you, Michael and Charlotte leave the Garrison. Charlotte has calmed down some. At least enough to get into Michael's swanky sports tourer without much of a hassle. With her slumped on the back seat of the Bentley, it's only the two of you now.

"Are you hurt?"

"I'm fine, Michael," you snap back, saying his new name like an insult. You're still angry with him, though at this point you're no longer sure for what, exactly. For being a right arse to you these past days? For coming to the Garrison tonight to ruin your date with Isaiah? For letting Charlotte blow him under the table?

"About what you said earlier–" He starts.

"I made a mistake. It was probably the rum. Makes me see things."

His legs eat up the distance between you. "Don't give me that shite, Y/N. Don't pretend with me." He's so close, your noses almost touch. His hands grip your arms above your elbows. Perhaps it's the darkness amplifying your senses, but you can hear his heartbeat hammering away like a tin drum.

"Like you've been doing with me?" You say quietly.

He looks away. "Get in the car."

"No."

"Don't be stubborn. Get in."

"Look after Charlotte." You're not sure what comes over you, but you wind your arms around him, nuzzling your face into his warm chest. His clothes smell like blood. After a moment, you feel the press of his hand on your back. Just resting there. Hesitant. Awkward. Like he hasn't hugged anyone in years. "I'll see you tomorrow, Henry," you whisper, and break away from him, reopening the distance between you.

Without a word, he takes off his jacket and wraps you up in it. For a second, his hands linger on your shoulders, his warmth seeping into you, then he nods to himself, turns around and gets into the car.

The car engine comes alive. You watch them drive off.

The acid that's been burning in the back of your mouth bubbles up.

You heave. Folding in the middle, you proceed to vomit your guts out, your hair falling messily into your face.

When you're done, you wipe your mouth and press your forehead against the rain-slick cobblestone.

After a moment, you pick yourself up like nothing happened and walk home. It's only when Lizzie sees the stains of Sonny's blood on her dress and makes you sit on the couch while she puts on a cup of tea, that you allow yourself to break a bit.


	7. Chapter 7

The young man in John's office looks terrified. He tries to hide it, but you can see it in the way he wets his lips, in the way he grips the arms of the chair he's sitting in, his twitchy manner. He looks pale and sickly, like he never fully recovered from a childhood illness.

"Scudboat said to go and speak to you. Tommy's orders.” Your voice is hoarse and achy from shouting your lungs out at the Bull Ring, yesterday. At least you still have a voice, which can't be said for the other Shelby ladies.

"Yeah, come on in," John tells you with an easy smile as you close the door behind you. "Y/N, this lad right here is Stephan Radischevski."

Leaning against the wall, you acknowledge Stephan with a brief nod. “Is this about that business with the Russians?"

"They're Georgians, actually, but fuck me if I know the bloody difference.” John chews on the pick sticking out of his mouth. "Arthur and I had a friendly talk with their butler. Gets loose-lipped on the whiskey. Turns out the Grand Duchess just fired a footman and her maid for fucking in the master bedroom. We managed to secure their posts for you two."

"And what's our real assignment?" You ask. "I doubt Tommy wants us there to wait on these people."

John unrolls the floor plan of an English country estate, that makes Arrow House look like some run-down workhouse in Bethnal Green, splaying it over the betting books stacked across his desk.

"We know that they keep all the valuable shite in a strong room somewhere in the grand-house," he says and points at the house's basement–septic, kitchen cellar, and wine cellar.

“What kind of valuables are we talking?”

“Sapphires, rubies, diamonds bigger than the dead tsar’s bollocks.”

Your ears prick up at the mention of diamonds. Old habits die hard for you.

"And you want us to find out where it’s hidden?" Stephan gulps nervously.

"Your job is to keep your ears and eyes open. Tommy want to know what the duchess takes with her tea, which of the house staff she's fucking, how many times they get up to take a piss at night, where–"

"I think we get the picture,” you scoff.

"Good." John folds up the blueprint and gets back to work on the books, glancing at Stephan. "Head's up, soldier. You're a Peaky Blinder now. Now fuck off."

Stephan gets up with such haste that the chair nearly topples over. The kid's in over his head, that's for sure. You just hope he doesn't prematurely blow both your covers with his stumbling.

Lizzie and Esme wave you over from their desks. Even from afar, you can see that they're hatching something. Tommy hasn't told them about the robbery yet, and now they've made it their mission to get you to crack. You've withstood police interrogations before, but those long, sleepless hours are jack shit compared to the joint efforts of two determined women.

With a sigh of defeat, you head toward them, passing Michael's office. He's hunched over a neatly organized stack of balance sheets, his brow creasing in concentration.

Two weeks have passed since Sabini's thugs stormed the Garrison and Michael–well, he's actually made an effort to be civil to you. He doesn't immediately leave and up when you enter a room, which is progress in your book.

Still, you startle when he calls your name. His pen scratches to a stop and his head snaps up. "Would you come in here for a moment?" He asks, steepling his hands–the perfect picture of politeness and professionalism. So far from the restless, angry boy he once was.

Esme and Lizzie both raise their eyebrows and start to whisper when you steps into his office, trepidation weighing down your feet.

"Close the door."

"As you wish, Mr. Gray," you snark but close it anyways. "Should I say hello to Charlotte too?"

"She isn't here," Michael says stiffly, a look of irritation crossing his face.

"Just checking in case she's hiding under the desk again."

"Y/N–"

You stifle a laugh. "Just say what you want to say, Michael."

"Right." He leans back in his chair, cracking his knuckles. The bruises haven't fully healed yet. "I need a favor," he starts, not looking particularly pleased about it.

"You can't tell anyone about it. Especially not my mother."

~ ~ ~

"You take a girl to the nicest places." Wrinkling your nose at the pungent smell of cow shit, you swat at a horsefly buzzing around your head.

"Where the hell are we?"

You stopped the car at the side of a road overlooking green pastures.

"Just outside of Lichfield." Michael gets out of the Bentley's driver's seat. He exchanged his custom-tailored suit and tie for simple wool trousers and a white cotton shirt, unbuttoned at the collar to reveal the sun-tanned skin of his neck. How he isn't pale as a corpse, with all the smog and smoke hanging over Birmingham, is a mystery to you. "My paren–the Johnsons used to take us here for picnics."

"Picnics, huh? Sounds like you had a grand old time with them." You try not to sound bitter as you open the car trunk and collect the empty bottles rolling around in there. One after another you line them up on the wooden fence.

"They were good people," he says. "I had a little brother."

You turn to look at him. "Really?"

A faint smile curves the corners of his mouth. "Yeah, Eddie. He could be a real pain in the arse. Always running after me."

Sometimes, I feel like I'm running after you too, Henry.

"He loved riding. We had a bay mare together. His birthday was last week. He has to be... shite, sixteen, by now. I don't think he would recognize me." His tone is matter-of-fact, like it doesn't bother him.

"What was her name?" You step away from the fence with empty hands. "The bay mare."

He goes quiet. The tips of his ears flush.

Your mouth falls open. "Michael Gray, you didn't! You named a horse after me?"

"It was a good horse," he mutters, rubbing the back of his neck, flustered. "Very good at...drafting...Christ."

"Oh, I should be flattered then."

Michael groans. "Just show me how to shoot one of these." He pulls out a black Webley.

"Ever shot one?"

"Once, with John and Arthur."

"Ah, let me guess, the three of you were completely hammered."

"I pointed it at John's face."

"Boys." You roll your eyes and grab the gun from him, taking up position ten-something yards away from the fence.

"First lesson: never point your gun at anything you're not willing to kill." You take aim and cock the hammer, feeling Michael's intent gaze upon you. "The grip is important. It has to be firm but not too tight or the recoil is going to break your arm. Steady. Then slowly pull the trigger."

The first bottle in the lineup gets knocked off the fence and explodes into shard dust.

With a satisfied smirk, you lower the gun and hold it out to him. "Your turn. Show me what you got."

He assumes the same stance you did moments ago, a good five feet closer to the target, shoulders tense. There's a sharp clink as the bullet grazes the bottle head, but misses.

"That wasn't too bad," you say generously.

Loading and cocking the gun, he tries again, missing by several inches this time. "This fucking thing," he curses.

"You're trying too hard."

"If I tried any less I'd shoot myself in the face."

You lean against the fence, the weather-worn slats heated by the sun. "Why is this so important to you? I thought Tommy was supposed to keep you away from that side of the family business."

"That's what my mum wants. She'd love nothing more than to have me kidnapped and put on train bound for London." He makes a frustrated sound. "But I never asked to be treated like a fucking kid."

"I know."

He stopped being a child the day he was taken from his home and given into the care of Father Hughes and the parish. You wonder if Polly knows. Probably not. Last you heard, St. Hilda's was still standing.

"You don't have to prove yourself to your cousins, Michael."

"It's not about them."

You trudge through the dewy grass, brushing up against him. "Then what is it about? I want to understand."

He tenses. "You were right, that night at the Garrison, when you thought you'd seen him. I saw him too."

Sucking in a harsh breath, you cover your mouth, mind racing. "Fuck. Are you sure?" A terrible feeling expands in your chest, bleeding out all that's soft and warmth, and turning it to cold, hard stone.

"I am."

"What's that bastard doing in Small Heath?"

"He's working with the Russians. Not sure which kind. Remember all that expensive shite he had in his office? That gold clock on the mantlepiece. No ordinary priest could afford that. He's been working with these people for a long time."

You're both quiet for a minute while you absorb this new information, watching a flock of plump sheep in the distance until Michael breaks the silence.

"What did it feel like to kill them, those men?"

"It felt good."

"Did it make you feel better?"

"No," you answer honestly. "You can ask if you want to, you know."

He hesitates. "What happened after I was taken away?"

"After the war ended, I was placed with a foundryman and his wife in Wolverhampton–Jack and Edith Teach. They didn't want a daughter. They needed someone to do household chores and run errands because Mrs. Teach was prone to sickness and bedridden most of the time. She was a paranoid, jealous bitch who thought I was trying to seduce her husband behind her back. She'd find excuses to have me beaten. A burnt piece of toast, a wrinkle in the sheets. She died of the Spanish flu in the first year. Left me alone in that fucking house with him. At first, Mr. Teach was just a boozehound, trying to forget like all the others who came back from France. He had a lame leg from a bayonet. Spent all his monthly wages on opium, stupid fuck. He'd come to my room at night and just stand there in front of the bed and stare at me. I tried to put a chair under the door handle, but that only made him angry. He wasn't a good man when he was angry."

A shudder rakes through you, even though the memory is hazy, at best.

"One night, two men came to the house. Friends of his, who worked at the same steel factory. I hid in my room while they drank, but that night, he called me downstairs to...entertain them. When I fought, he didn't like that."

You squeeze your eyes shut as if that could stop you from seeing every vivid detail of that night in your mind.

"He kept a shotgun over the fireplace. I got the hold of it and shot three times. Only killed one of them. I had a shit aim.

I turned the gas on the stove on and poured what was left of the booze over them. Cheap rum burns easily. Then I left. Took nothing with me. The police only found their teeth and their wedding rings in the ashes. I sometimes dream of going back to St. Hilda’s and doing the same thing. Just raze it all to the ground and watch the smoke and the nuns' hands press against the windows from the inside. Does that make me a monster?"

Your words go through him like a bullet. Michael grabs your chin between his thumb and forefinger.

"I'd hold the fucking match." He turns your face to him. "I'm going to kill him, Y/N. I'll kill him for what he did to us and all the others. Tommy promised." Still holding your chin between his fingers, he reaches into the pocket of his trouser and presents you with a single bullet in his open palm.

HUGHES has been carved into its copper shell.

You clamp your hand around his, touching the thin white scar on your thumb against his matching one. "I want to be there when you do it. I have to see."

He nods, lifting his gaze from your linked thumbs to your mouth.

Feeling like you're about to say or do something very stupid, you slip away to the edge of the fence. You gesture toward the Webley in his left hand. "Try again."

Always the quick study, Michael starts to get the hang of it after a few more misses.

You spent the whole morning on that little green patch until you decide to head back to the car when the day edges toward noon.

By the car, he's patting down his trousers for the keys. "Where–"

You dance away, keys jingling in your hand. "I'm driving."


	8. Chapter 8

4 weeks later...

Your cheek throbs like a painful second pulse as Mary, Tommy's housekeeper, opens the servant door for you. The old woman reminds you of the nuns at the orphanage with her severely scraped back hair, black dress, and stiff-lipped visage.

She critically eyes the baby blue house maid uniform and matching pinned apron you're expected to wear at Wilderness House. You didn't have time to change. Tommy's instructions were clear on that. No detours. No delays.

You rip the white cap from your head. "Good morning, Mary," you say and wince. Talking hurts your cheek. The side Tatiana slapped feels hot and swollen to the touch. You wouldn't be surprised if the jewel-crusted rings she wore on every finger like brass knuckles actually cracked a bone or two. "Where are they? Did they start without me?"

Mary's pruned mouth pinches. "Mr. Shelby is still occupied in the drawing room. The young gentlemen and Johnny Dogs are waiting in the downstairs kitchen. Shall I–"

You wave her off and blow past her, tracking dusty footprints over the Persian rugs. "No need, Mary. I know the way." All the old country houses have similar layouts, and after spending four weeks familiarizing yourself with every nook and cranny of an estate twice the size of Arrow House, you have no trouble locating the servant quarters.

You haven't even stepped into the kitchen yet when male voices float toward you.

"You've got two choices, Michael. You fuck off to America to join the Apaches, or you marry the girl."

What the fuck? A sinking feeling grows in the pit of your stomach. Suddenly, you don't even notice the pain in your cheek anymore.

"This isn't a joke."

"Told her father yet?"

"No."

"He'll fucking shoot you, man."

"Are you sure the kid's yours?"

Kid? Your insides freeze over. Charlotte is pregnant with Michael's baby?

"I wish I hadn't told you."

"Then think of marriage as a beautiful road, flowers all the way down it."

"Is he joking?"

"Oh, it's hard to tell these days."

You've heard enough. Putting on an indifferent face, you saunter into the kitchen. Michael, Arthur, John, and Johnny Dogs all sit around the hazy room. It smells like cigars and rum, both of the expensive variety. The men go silent when they see you, the expressions on their faces ranging from surprised to visibly uncomfortable.

"Please, don't let me interrupt your tea party, boys." You can feel their gazes on your back as you start rummaging through the kitchen cabinets, hunting for a pail of crushed ice and a dry dishrag to bundle it into an ice pack.

"Didn't think I'd ever see you wearing a fooking apron, Y/N," Arthur says tactfully.

You press the ice pack to your cheek. The cool relief and numbing effect are instantaneous.

"Your brother has a way of making us do things we never thought we'd have to do, doesn't he, Arthur?" You nod toward the pot on the stove. "Is there still tea in there?" Johnny almost trips over himself in his haste to pour you a cup.

"How much did you hear?" Michael asks flatly, his hands braced on the table. His hair and three-piece suit look immaculate as always, but there are dark rings under his eyes, and his tie is tied crookedly as if he couldn't get his hands to hold still this morning.

You take a sip of the weak, lukewarm tea. "Enough to confidently tell you that you're a fucking idiot."

John lets out a snort at that. "I'm beginning to think you should be more afraid of our Y/N here than the girl's father."

"Shut up, John," you and Michael snap in unison.

"I know the nuns weren't exactly forthcoming with that kind of information, but would it have been too fucking much to wrap it up, or you know, pull out the old-fashioned way?"

"I can't believe I'm discussing this with you," Michael sighs, rubbing his forehead.

"Better get bloody used to it. You'll be doing a lot more than discussing when Polly gets wind of this."

"She won't."

You chuckle into your tea cup. "Yeah, good luck with that."

'Do you, uh, love the woman?" Arthur stammers.

My god, what if he did love Charlotte? You didn't even consider that.

Michael's face goes blank. "Fucking what?"

"Well, go and marry her like the rest of us," Arthur says roughly.

Michael paces around the table, grabbing his head. His pacing is making you so antsy that you have to sit down. "She doesn't want her family to know. She doesn't wanna have the baby."

"We know a woman," John throws in, expression grim. "Same woman who helped you out twice, Arthur."

"Not my women."

"That's why you had them fixed."

You clench your teeth, staring at the tea dregs at the bottom of your cup, your hands tightening on the delicate china.

"Charlotte will want the best," Michael murmurs.

"She is the best," John assures him. "She used to be a nurse. Twenty minutes. Done."

"You don't have to go in or wait outside," Arthur adds. "You go to the Garrison, drink whiskey, have a laugh."

The laugh that erupts from you is a sharp, bitter thing, but your voice is sharper still. "Well, wasn't that bloody convenient for you. Must be great to never have to get your hands dirty, or take some fucking responsibility. No, it's so easy for you men to just turn your backs and walk away."

You look between the four men. None of them holds your gaze, like little boys after a scolding. "Remember Jane Mason, Michael? Blonde. Pretty girl. Had a voice that could make the angels cry."

He nods.

"Every night before lights-out, she'd stand on her bed and sing Amazing Grace for the rest of us girls. She fancied herself quite in love with you, would you believe it," you remember with a sad smile. "Wouldn't stop talking about you even after you were gone. We found her one Easter morning, her blood already cold on the sheets." The weight of the memory creases up your brain in a headache. "The fork she used on herself to get rid of it was still in her hand. She must have sneaked it into the dormitory after dinner. You know how old she was? Fucking fourteen."

"Jesus," Arthur rasps and pulls a swig straight from the bottle.

"They didn't give her a proper Christian burial because after what she did–after what had been done to her–Jane Mason wasn't a good Catholic girl anymore. The parish put her in an unmarked grave down by the river, where they bury sinners and vagrants and whores. There was no more singing after she died."

You stand up abruptly, forcing Michael to look at you. "Don't you dare let Charlotte go in there alone. Don't you dare."

The servant bell rings, the sound clear and cheerful.

"Tommy said when that bell rings we're to all go to the big room." Johnny sniffs, pushing himself away from the kitchen sink. He pats Michael's back in passing. "Come on. Tommy has a plan."

"Has that ever reassured anyone?" You mutter as you and the boys pile out of the kitchen and up the narrow servant staircase. Arthur hangs back behind the rest of you, clearly upset with what you just told them. Loose cannon or not, it's obvious to you that Arthur feels things more intensely, more viscerally, than any of the other Shelbys. You can relate to that. Lately, you've been feeling like an overstimulated nerve.

You're second to enter the drawing room after Michael. "Boss," you say in greeting.

Tommy looks to be in better shape than when you last visited him in that gloomy hospital room, pumped full of opium and manically scheeming. At least, Mary got him to wear trousers this time. Father Hughes and his cronies really did a number on him, but Tommy Shelby is the living proof that a diet of cigarettes and whiskey does wonders for restoring a man to health.

"So, let me get this, Tommy," the bearded man next to Tommy booms with a near intelligible Cockney accent. He pulls a pair of gold-rimmed, half-moon glasses from his heavy black coat and peers at you through them. "You is not only powerful enough to summon up Jews, right, but you can pull black cats out of your hat, too? That's mighty fucking impressive, mate, innit? Fucking magician right here."

"Hello, Alfie," you calmly greet the Jewish gang leader, very much to the astonishment of everyone present. "You've gotten old."

"You know each other?" Tommy asks coolly

Shrugging, you drop to the sofa. "Everyone in London knows each other, isn't that right, Alfie? We were all a big, happy family. Ask Sabini."

In that moment, Arthur skulks through the door, his wiry shoulders hunched. He freezes and immediately bolts when he sees Alfie.

"Arthur, shalom! Shalom!" Alfie crows, arms spread wide in welcome, but you know from your past, if infrequent, dealings with him that this whole thing can turn bloody, at any moment. Poor Arthur looks like he's praying for his god to strike him down right where he stands.

"Come here, come here. Let's sit down. I owe you a little something, don't I?" Alfie continues to take the piss out of Arthur's new found spirituality and the whole thing ends a few provocations scant of Arthur bashing in Alfie's skull with an ash tray.

"Let's all get along, boys." You gently extricate the blunt object from Arthur's shaking grip and put it back on the deal table. "This isn't helping anyone."

"If we're gonna do business with this fucker, I demand to know why." Arthur shudders.

"Right," Tommy starts, addressing the whole room. "While I was in the hospital, I formulated a plan, and this is how it's gonna work. So, the Russians cannot be trusted to pay us. We are gonna take what is ours. We need to see what's in their treasury. And that is why we need Mr. Solomons. Please, Y/N." He motions for you to stand up, and join him at his desk. "Give your report."

"Alright, listen up, gents, this is the low-down." You link your hands behind your back. "The treasury can only be accessed through a hidden door in the wine cellar. We're not catching these Russians with their pants down. They've prepared for this. The walls are fortified and lined with metal balls jammed between two massive steel plates. So, tunneling through will be a bitch, if not impossible."

"How many guards?" John asks, looking rather unimpressed with the security measures the Russians have taken.

"Thirty cossacks in the grand-house, maybe more. They're mean bastards, the lot of them. So," you end your report. "Overall, it's not looking too fucking good, Tommy, unless you know someone who can walk through solid walls. Apart from these minor setbacks, I have full confidence in you and this enterprise."

Tommy clears his throat. "Thank you, Y/N. John, Arthur and l will go there tonight. I've set up a meeting with Duke Leon to select our share of the price. Alfie will be there as our jewelry appraiser. Any questions?"

"What about me?" You ask. "Saturday is my night off."

Tommy points his half smoked cigarette at you. "I don't want you at that house tonight. Your employment there is finished. You'll accompany Polly and Michael to London. I need you to get in touch with some of your old contacts. And some of mine."

~~~

Polly, Michael, and you arrive at Ada's in the early evening, worn out from the long drive. Ringing for the cook to prepare some sandwiches and tea, Ada leads you three weary travelers into the drawing room.

For a communist, her pastel-colored Regency townhouse is rather un-Marxist. Tommy probably acquired it from some poor lordling, who, like the rest of England's peerage, had fallen on bad times after the war and lost his property on a fool's errand in one of the Shelby casinos.

"I brought Michael because as chief accountant he has to be witness," Polly explains as she tugs off her gloves.

"And you?" Ada looks at you hovering by the door, still wearing your coat and hat. "Are you going out? If you want to go dancing, there's a really class jazz club not far from here."

"Maybe another time. Tommy needs something done. I won't be back before midnight."

Ada sighs, not unkindly. "I hope my brother pays you well."

"Better than the King."

"Your room is next to mine. Try to be quiet when you come in so you don't wake up Karl. And don't track blood in here. I just had the carpets cleaned."

"You won't even know I'm here," you promise.

The cook enters with a platter of thinly sliced cucumber sandwiches. You pick one from the top of the stack to eat on the go.

"Ada, can I, uh, use your phone?" Michael asks distractedly. It's more than you've heard him speak all day, including the three hour drive you spent cooped up in Polly's Vauxhall. You know what's on his mind, of course. You offered to make the call for him, but he refused, saying that this was something he has to do on his own.

"Michael," his mother says as she takes a seat at the set table, sorting through some dossiers. "Business first. Sit down."

You glance at the loudly ticking grandfather clock. Almost six o'clock. At seven, you're set to meet an old jeweler contact of yours in his shop in Camden Town, and after that, you're going to meet with Tommy's contact in a pub on Camden Street. Enough time to drop by your old flat and remove the money from your secret stash under the floorboards. Just as a precaution, in case Tommy's plan goes to shit and you have to leave the country, fast.

"Michael, stop looking at your watch."

His leg jumps under the table. "Ada, whilst you're, um, reading this, can I go and use your phone?"

"Who's the lucky girl?" Ada smiles as she signs one of the papers.

"Her name is Charlotte," Polly says in a snide voice, "and Michael cannot breathe if he doesn't talk to her every two hours. She's a nice girl." Her gaze briefly lands on you. "Not many of those to be found in Birmingham."

~~~

The clocktower strikes one o'clock when you leave Cross Bones pub and hail a hackney to take you back to Primrose Hill. Both meetings went well. Tommy's contact turned out to be a certain Private William Letso, a tunneler from the South African Native Labor Corps who'd served with him in the war. He readily agreed to Tommy's plan before you even finished the proposal Tommy had prepared. He and the rest of their squad will join the Peaky Blinders up north in Birmingham before the week is out.

When you let yourself in through the backdoor, the house is dark. Someone in the upper stairs bedroom is playing the radio. With a sigh, you slip off your shoes and tip toe up the stairs to your room for the night.

"Stop."

Slowly you pivot, backtracking to the living room you just passed. Polly sits in one of the armchairs facing the fireplace like a queen holding court.

"Sit," she instructs. You have half the mind to refuse, just to be a nuisance, but it's been a long day and you can't summon the energy to be difficult.

"You and Michael are close." It's not a question. "He talks to you, tells you things he wouldn't share with anyone else."

"He doesn't tell me everything."

"Don't lie to me."

"Maybe you should ask his girlfriend."

Polly takes a pull on her cigarette and exhales. "I think we both know that Charlotte isn't going to be a constant in my son's life. She's just a girl."

"And I'm not?"

She gazes into the dying fire. "If he had to chose between me and you, I'm not sure which one he'd chose."

"Is that why you don't like me?"

"Don't like you." A smile ghosts over her lips. "You remind me of myself before I had Michael and Anna. Wild, fickle. Selfish. I damn near broke my mother's heart. I know what's in your pocket, Y/N. You've already planned ahead in case Thomas's plan backfires. It's what I would have done. You'll disappear to save your own skin, and you'll break my son's heart."

You swallow hard, folding your hands in your lap. "You know nothing about me."

"Do you love him?"

A log pops in the fireplace, eddying embers and sparks.

"Go to bed," Polly dismisses you when your silence goes on for too long.

You pause at the door. "I would ask him to come away with me if I didn't already know the answer. I won't make him choose." With that you turn your back on the woman and slink up the stairs, lightening your footsteps as you pass Karl's room. You expected to see light shine through the slash of space under Michael's door. He often works through the night. In the past few weeks, you often found him passed out at his desk in the morning. But not tonight, apparently.

You move on to your room. Moonlight shines through the curtains, silvery and diluted like water color, casting the room in shadows. You throw your shoes and hat on the armchair beside the door. Walking toward the bed, you shrug off your coat. Your arms reach over your shoulder to undo the row of clever little buttons at the back of your dress when you bump into something hard–a piece of furniture?

The piece of furniture gives a muffled, decidedly male sound of protest. An empty whiskey bottles rolls over the rosewood floor and knocks against your foot. Acting on pure instinct, you grab the bottle, ready to smash it over the intruder's head and make him eat the glass.

"...Y/N..?”

"What the fuck?" You lower the bottle and turn on the small lamp on the bedside table. "Michael? What are you doing here?"

Slumped against the side of your bed, he squints groggily at the sudden flare of brightness. He looks positively rumpled. His tie is undone, hanging around his neck like he ripped it from his collar in a fit. His waistcoat and the cuffs of his dress shirt are unbuttoned and wrinkled.

Despite the shock of seeing him in such an undignified state, a laugh escapes you. "Jesus, but you look like shite." In an attractive way, an unbidden voice adds in the back of your mind. "Did you get lost on the way to your room?"

"Couldn't sleep," he slurs. "Had a bit of a nightcap."

"I can see that," you say sarcastically, tipping over the empty bottle. Not a drop. "You drank all that by yourself?"

"Yeah." He gives you a sheepish, very un-Michael-like smile. You've never seen him drunk before. Even at the Garrison, he would always drink in moderation, while the rest of you were pissed out your heads. He likes to be in control, you know. In control of himself and other people. Perhaps to make up for the times he wasn't.

"Well, you're at an advantage, then." You pick a crystal decanter from the vanity and pour a finger of the amber liquid into a glass. So, that's where Tommy keeps the good stuff. You return to Michael and slide to the floor beside him, your back propped against the bed. "Is it done?" You ask after a beat.

He runs a hand over the back of his head, further messing up his hair. "Friday, next week."

You nod slowly. "That's good." The sooner this gets taken care off, the better. "How is Charlotte holding up?"

"Afraid her parents will find out."

"Your mother is getting suspicious. She cornered me just now when I came back."

"Fuck, she would." Michael groans, rubbing both hands over his face. "Did you–"

"Tell her? What do you think?" You lightly bump his shoulder with yours. "Of course, I didn't."

He closes his eyes, shaking his head. "This is so fucked up. It's all wrong. I can't be a father, Y/N. I can't do it."

"That's alright. You're still young. Maybe someday–"

"No, I mean, never. I can't be those things–a father, a husband. It's like he broke something in me."

"That bastard broke nothing. Hey, look at me." You cup his face in your hands, the light stubble on his cheeks pricking your palms. "Fuck Hughes. He's nothing. He tried to break us, but he couldn't fucking do it. None of them could. Listen to me, Michael. We're not broken, do you understand?" You say forcefully, smoothing your thumbs over his cheekbones. "We're not broken."

His unfocused eyes have dropped to your mouth. 

"Why are you looking at me like that?" You whisper.

He doesn't answer.

There's a certain artlessness in the way your lips meet. All sweaty palms and trembling, unsure lips. Michael tastes like whiskey and peppermint toothpaste.

"Never done that." He presses the words against your mouth like a secret while you catch your breath.

"Never? Why?"

He deepens the kiss, one hand tangling in your hair, his deft, long fingers removing pin after pin as your mouths collide hotly.

Pling, pling, they clatter to the floor.

His other hand smoothes over your hip and strokes upward, molding around your rib cage. The slow, but increasingly intense slide of his tongue against yours makes your toes curl. Your back is to the floor, him between your thighs. This doesn't feel real, you think, mind blank, and then you stop thinking all together, because Michael is sucking bruises into the skin of your neck and lightly biting the sensitive spot between neck and shoulder. You pull his hair, enjoying how soft it feels as you card your fingers through it. Sliding your hands beneath his shirt, the muscles of his back bunch and tense under your touch.

It's when his kisses reach the dip between your breasts that the pleasurable haze in your mind clears.

You pet the curling hair at the nape of his neck. "We can't–"

"Why not?" He presses a kiss beneath your jaw, teeth scraping.

"Michael, stop."

He lifts his head from your tits, bracing himself above you. His thumb brushes over your brow. "What's wrong? Did I hurt you?"

You roll out from under him and pull up your dress. You knocked over the whiskey glass in your passion. Now there's a stain on the cream-colored carpet. "No, it's not that."

His eyes narrow. You can practically feel his walls snapping up. "Is it because of Isaiah? Did you fuck him?" He says it without emotion, like he doesn't care either way, which just pisses you off. He has no right to be jealous, not with the way he's paraded Charlotte around the office and the Garrison for weeks.

"And what if I did fuck him?" You snap back and immediately regret it. Using Isaiah, a common friend, to get back at Michael was petty.

"You're drunk, and you have a girlfriend, who is pregnant with your baby, for fuck's sake," you whisper-shout, trying not to wake Karl or Ada, next door.

"We already broke up before she told me she was pregnant."

"It's still unfair to her."

You're both on your feet now. Michael stares at you, chest heaving. "This was a mistake," he says coldly.

"Clearly," you bite back.

The door shuts between you with a resounding thud, that seems to cut the thread that connected you, just minutes ago.

Thoughts rattle around your head like loose bullets, a riot of confusion and hurt swirling in your chest. What the fuck just happened?

Your lips burn from Michaels’ kisses. You drop on the bed, your hands clenching on your kneecaps as you stare at the darkish stain on the carpet. "Fuck, Ada is going to kill me."

~~~

Michael doesn't show his face in the breakfast room, the next morning.

"Heartbroken, the poor love," Ada sighs from behind the newspaper while you miserably shove a piece of toast in your mouth. "I remember what that's like."

"Your husband?" You ask around a mouthful.

"Oh, no, Freddie never broke my heart," she says with a smile and snaps the newspaper shut. "Polly called this morning. She wants me to tell you that she took the car last night. You and Michael will have to take the train."

To say the train ride back to Birmingham was awkward would be an understatement. Michael refuses to look at you or speak with you or acknowledge your existence. Instead, he acts like he's never met you before. The other travelers in your compartment start giving you judging looks as if you're some desperate slag, who can't take a hint and keeps harassing him.

When he ignores your attempts to offer him one of the sandwiches Ada had Mrs. Cole pack for you, your patience finally runs out. "Michael, this is getting ridiculous. Stop acting like a fucking git and take the bloody sandwich."

The prick actually stands up and leaves the compartment without a word.

"Wise up, dearie," the woman beside you says. "He's just not keen on ya."

"Don't I know it," you grouse.

Michael doesn't return to the cabin, and by the time you get off the train, he's already left the station


	9. Chapter 9

The June sun beats down on your feather-adorned hat. You feel tiny pearls of sweat build on your upper lip.

Wedged between Lizzie and Tommy, you plaster a smile on your face, cheeks smarting from the strain of holding it for so long. John and Esme's daughter, Kitty, wriggles in your arms and waves at the camera man. Adjusting her on your hip, you grab her hand and smack a kiss on the center of her sticky palm, which makes the little girl giggle.

It took all but ten minutes to herd all the Shelby children to that picturesque spot by the cherry tree in front of the steps of the Grace Shelby Institute. Another five to get the little rascals to hold still and stop Karl from sticking out his tongue at the camera.

"Everyone smile in one...two...three–"

The flash of the camera going off makes golden blotches appear in your eyes.

Like the rest of the Shelby clan, you're wearing your best dress for the occasion. It has a box pleated skirt and a tie belt accentuating the loose, dropped waist. Its light, crisp Nile green crepe de chine fabric swishes around your knees.

You bought it last weekend, when you, Lizzie, Esme, and Linda went to Fraser & Sons on Temple Row to burn some of that Shelby money for new dresses, Japanese silk scarves and those ridiculous hats ladies wore at Royal Ascot. Unsurprisingly, Linda disapproved of your frivolousness and only bought herself a sensible pair of the clunkiest, ugliest shoes you've ever seen. They made her feet look like fucking bricks.

After the photographs for the London Times and Birmingham Mail have been taken, you hand Kitty over to her mother, and follow the men inside. The building still smells of paint, but its cool buffed marble interior is a welcome relief from the hot summer day.

Everyone of name and rank within a thirty mile radius has been invited here today. They make speeches and praise the Shelbys as honor citizens. A whole row at the front is reserved for a group of wide-eyed children–the poor and unwanted– who are visibly intimidated by the fanfare and media circus. Chances are that no one has ever paid them that much attention before. Your insides swoop as you imagine yourself and Michael among them.

Speak of the devil, from the corner of your eye, you catch him looking in the same direction face blank and jaw tight. He's looking extra handsome today in his clean-cut, gray pinstripe suit. Like a younger, more polished version of Tommy.

It's been a two weeks since your drunken kiss at Ada's, and you're back to avoiding each other. The entire thing is awkward and un-fucking-acceptable.

You find your seat beside Lizzie, who saved one for you, and try not to fall asleep as the speeches blend into each other.

The Lord Mayor. Some boring old snob from the city council. The chairwoman of the Mosley's War Widow's Institute. Polly. Tommy. Polly again.

Baby Charlie is not the only one becoming frustrated by how the talking and singing seem to drag on forever. You squirm on the bench, not even pretending to mouth words along to the hymn.

Why is this taking so bloody long, you think with mounting impatience.

When the official part of the ceremony is finally done with, and the guests start to funnel through the doors on both sides of the stage into the reception hall to gorge themselves on tea and cake, Ada taps your shoulder. "Have you seen Tommy?" She asks, looking stressed.

You shrug. "He snuck out during Immortal Invisible." The lucky bastard. "That's way. Why?"

Ada sighs. "Of course he did. Well, when you see him, tell him the Lord Mayor has been asking to have tea with him. And there's a reporter from the New York Times who wants to take his photograph," she trails off, eyes narrowing at something behind you. "Oh, for fuck's sake! Finn, Karl, stop looting the donation boxes. Can this family cease acting like a band of hooligans for one bloody day?" She hurries after them.

You're about to join the reception when you clock Michael disappearing through the side door you'd indicated to Ada. Chewing your lip, you debate inwardly for a moment before you set off to confront him.

“Michael, we need to talk—”

He stops suddenly, hands clenching and unclenching at his sides, his eyes boring into Father Hughes' back.

"You will not deviate. You will not fail," the priest threatens Tommy in that menacingly soft voice that narrates your nightmares.

When Hughes comes toward you, once again wearing the mask of the friendly priest, you have to fight the urge to slip your hand into Michael's. Like an abused fucking dog cowering from its masters' stick, you lower your eyes.

For a moment, you delude yourself into thinking that he won't recognize you, that he'll walk past you...too many years, too many others...but then he leans in, his hot, vinegar breath fanning your cheek.

"Like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth. What book is that, Y/N?"

You bite the inside of your cheek. The taste of copper floods your mouth as if there's a tarnished penny resting under your tongue. The verse's meaning isn't lost on you, nor Michael, judging by the way he stops breathing, pupils contracting.

Don't say a word. To anyone. Ever.

"It's Isaiah 53:7," Hughes says with a lenient, fatherly smile. "You've been neglecting your Bible studies, I see."

A train of chattering children passes behind you, their innocent laughter a cruel, twisted contrast to the conversation that just took place. A punch to the gut that knocks the air from your lungs.

"Come on, little fellas," Hughes calls, guiding them through the other door like a shepherd leading his flock.

Michael can't stand to look at you.

With trembling fingers you push a strand of hair out of your face with one hand and adjust your hat with the other. "The Lord Mayor wants you to show your face at the reception, Tommy." You try your damn hardest to rein your voice into something resembling poise, even though you feel frayed and thin, close to falling apart like old, worn leather.

"Thank you, Y/N." Tommy says passively. There's an unspoken understanding between the three of you. You won't talk about what just happened. And Hughes is going down.

~~~

"Please, excuse me, Mrs. Haywood. I think Mr. Shelby over there is waving at me."

You extricate yourself from the clutches of the Lord Mayor's wife with a polite smile, retreating so fast that you spill some of your tea.

"Certainly, dear, I hope to see you at our next ladies luncheon."

You're going to throw yourself down a flight of stairs if you have to listen to one more word from these bored socialites, who love nothing more than to philosophize over the plight of orphans and the poor working class while stuffing themselves with scones and imported darjeeling tea.

"You looked like you needed saving." John grins. "How 'bout something to take the edge off?" He pulls a small silver flask from his coat pocket, holding it out in offering.

You could take him by the ears and kiss him. "Fuck, yes, pour one out."

Your hands are still shacky from your encounter with Hughes earlier as you gulp down the spiked tea. "How is it that you and Arthur get to have fun while the rest of us has to poster with these nobs?"

John laughs and takes a casual swig from the flask himself. "You've heard the same speech I did, Y/N. Smile and mingle. It's for the good of the company."

"You might want to remind Arthur. He's looking a bit scared over there."

"Yeah, one of those rich war widows has been trying to cop a feel of him all day. Fucking insatiable the lot of them, I tell you. Like hyenas."

You lower your voice. "How is our Private Letso faring? Making good progress, I hope?"

"Until this morning. Tunnel's hit some heavy clay."

Well, shit.

"That's bound to slow them down. Does Tommy know?"

"Mhm, just told him–"

"Cecelia?"

You've got to be fucking kidding–you just can't catch a break, can you?

"Give me a minute, John Boy," you say quietly and push your tea cup into his hands. Spine stuff as a board, you turn toward the caller, mentally filing through all the possible escape routes at your disposal. It's not looking too good for you.

Harvey Routledge looks fucking furious as he stalks toward you.

In the interest of avoiding a public incident and not bringing down Polly's wrath upon you for embarrassing the company on this day, you lead him away from the crowd, into the sweltering summer haze.

The sun blinds you as you face him.

"It's really you. I had to be sure. I had to know," he mutters.

You wish you'd brought your hat. The air smells of traffic, hot, baking asphalt, and white hydrangeas from across the street.

"What are you doing here, Harv?"

His chiseled, all-American-boy features flush as he sneers at you. He's a hothead like his old man. "Grace was my cousin. This institute is named in her memory. I have every right to be here. But you? Stealing from orphans now, is it?"

"I'm working for Mr. Shelby."

"And what does that work entail, exactly?" Harvey hisses, his eyes flashing angrily.

He thinks you're fucking Tommy. Well, isn't that grand. And ironic, considering you're probably the only unrelated woman at this event, who isn't actively trying.

"I meant, what are you still doing in Birmingham?Missed your ship?" You mock him.

His chest puffs out. So predictable. "Father made me head of our London headquarters. I'm here to stay."

"You're joking."

His expression tells you that he's very much not in a joking mood.

"But why?"

"Because I'm not fucking done with this city yet." You flinch as he reaches out to stroke your cheek with his thumb, brushing it down your throat until it rests over your pulse point. "With you." He applies pressure, his touch going from gentle to cruel in a split-second.

Before you can do anything, he has you backed into the side of the building. Pain shoots through the base of your skull as he slams you against the wall.

"You lied to me. You stole from me." His face turns an unattractive shade of prune when he tightens his grip on your neck. "And then you paid me off like some fucking tramp on Mulberry Street. I'm Harvey fucking Routledge. No one makes Harvey Routledge look like a fool!"

"No, you manage that just fine all by yourself, Harv," you choke out.

"You little–Did you work for Shelby all along, huh? Did he put you up to this? Are you his little whore?"

Just then, you catch a blur of movement on the very edge of your vision. A nurse dashing down the steps of the Institute and running toward an inconspicuous black Ford with a wailing toddler in her arms. A man is waiting for her in the car. The child is wearing a little green coat, just like the one–oh my god.

"Charlie." Pure ice shoots through your veins as the nurse wrangles the screaming child into the car. "Charlie!"

The car door slams closed, and the huffy engine roars up. Tires screech.

They're getting away.

You kick up your knee, pistoning it squarely into Harvey's crotch, while simultaneously butting your head against his nose with a satisfying crack. He staggers back with a pained shout as blood streams from his now lumpy nose, but there's no time to feel smug about it.

You're already tearing after the Ford that's now speeding down the street, your heart hammering frantically against the bars of your rib cage.

Without breaking your pace once, you throw yourself into traffic. Cars honk at you. You only have a few precious seconds to catch up to the car or Charlie will be beyond your reach. Lost. Somehow, you're able to push yourself a little further, make your legs go faster. The distance between you and the black Ford gets smaller and smaller as you close in and–

The other car comes out of nowhere. Barreling from a small side street as if it had been lying in wait for you.

You hear rather than feel your bones snap as your body folds around the twisting sheeted metal. For a surreal moment, you're suspended in mid-air–a battered ragdoll flung carelessly across the room in a child's tantrum.

The drag of the coarse asphalt rips the delicate fabric of your dress and breaks your skin. You can't feel your right leg.

The car door opens and the driver gets out. A pair of black boots comes to stand in front of your prone body. Roughly, without care for your comfort or injured leg, you’re turned on your back. The sun makes your eyes water. 

“Charlie….” Your voice sounds broken even to your own ears.

“Haven’t I taught you that nosiness is a sin?” Father Hughes muses. “It seems to me that you need a reminder.”

His smile is the last thing you see before his boot crashes into your face and darkness descends over your eyes. As you’re dragged under, a snatched memory flickers through the mire of your fading consciousness. In peace I will lie down and sleep, for you alone, O Lord, will keep me safe.

It’s a lie, you know. No one can save you now. Especially not God. Because the next time you open your eyes, you’ll be a far cry from heaven.


	10. Chapter 10

The blurry stain on the wall shapes into a crucifix as the world comes back into focus.

_Where the hell am I?_

The sheer number of crucifixes, carved Madonnas, and the dusty confessional in the corner suggest the confession room of some sort of chapel.

Your face feels feverish and swollen, and there's a tightness around your mouth. Dried blood. It's leaked into your mouth too. That fucker, Hughes, got you good. You feel like an open wound, bleeding on all ends, but the blunt pain in your face pales in comparison to the fire that engulfs your leg when you try to pick yourself up from the cold floor.

You're well and truly fucked. A bloody sitting duck.

A small whimper pulls you from your dark thoughts. Charlie is sitting on a stained cot not far from you, mouthing contentedly on a spoon. Your stomach sours as you realize who must have given it to him; that he's been alone with that monster while you were out.

He gives you a sweet, gummy smile when he sees you're awake, and makes a happy, little cooing sound.

Hissing sharply through your teeth, you pull yourself into a sitting position. "It's all right, little bean. I'm right here. I'll protect you. I'm going to get us out of here, Charlie, all right?"

You're babbling, just as much to calm yourself as to soothe Charles. The chilling truth is you can't put up a real fight against Hughes in your current state.

Hell, you can't even get up.

The small, rectangular window looks breakable enough to be smashed in with one of those heavy Madonna figurines, but it's too high up the mold-mottled wall to climb through, at least not without injuring yourself or the little one.

Your eyes flit to the door. Cheerful whistling sounds come from the other side. The key rustles in the lock.

You act on pure animal instinct as you launch yourself between the opening door and Charlie, gathering the squirming boy into your arms. He thinks it's a game and grabs tiny fistfuls of your hair. You shush him, your eyes never leaving the priest as he enters, the key dangling noisily from a chain around his thin middle.

"You're still alive. Good," he says in that pleasant, reasonable voice that makes you want to rake your nails down his face until that smile hangs in ribbons.

He pulls a chair toward you and sits down. "It's fascinating how much pain the human body can tolerate before it finally breaks. Young bodies are particularly resilient, don't you agree?"

You hug Charlie close. "What is this place?"

Hughes smiles, baring yellow, tea-stained teeth. "We're in a house of God. Is that a comfort to you?"

Your death glare is answer enough.

"Ah, I think not." He clicks his tongue. "It pains me greatly to see the depraved path you and Henry have taken. So ungrateful after all the education we provided at St. Hilda's purely out of the goodness of our Christian hearts."

"What do you want?"

Hughes leans forward. "For Mr. Shelby to hold up his end of the deal. If he succeeds and delivers the Russian jewels to our office by the time the St. Andrews clock strikes five am, you and the boy are free to go."

You don't have to ask what happens if Tommy fails, but Hughes goes on, regardless.

"If not." He puts a revolver in his lap. "This gun will unload in your head. Outside, of course. Killing in His house would not endear me to our Lord in heaven." He smacks his repulsive lips. "As for the boy, we would find him another loving home."

You choke down the cricket-ball-sized lump of puke lodged in your throat.

"You rotten fuck," you spit. "Tommy will find you and gut you like the pig you are."

Hughes moves faster than you'd have expected for a man of his profession. He digs his soft fingers in your thigh, where the bone fractured, and twists cruelly.

The world flashes white and red. You keen loudly, tears shooting into your eyes. The pain nearly makes you black out, and your scalp burns as he drags your head back by the hair.

"Thomas Shelby is finished," Hughes hisses, his true self oozing through the cracks in his smile. "He and his little organization belong to me. If I wanted him to blow up this entire rats nest you all call home, he'd ask how much dynamite I need. He'd suck my cock just for a chance to see his son again. You see, the boy is much more valuable to me alive than dead. But who will come for you, huh? You come from nothing. You are nothing. No family. No one to mourn you. No–"

The old floorboards creak outside the door. Footsteps.

"There's one."

A look of genuine confusion and shock crosses his doughy face. He did not expect to be found. Hughes rushes from the room. A few seconds later, a gun's being cocked.

"What do you think you're doing, boy?"

"Where are they?" Fear and relief vie for dominance in your chest at hearing Michael's voice. He came for you. Like he always promised he would.

"Please don't," Hughes whimpers pathetically. "Please don't shoot. Please don't shoot."

"Michael," you scream. "Michael, he has a gun."

A shot rings through the nave, bouncing off the vaulted ceiling. Charlie starts crying, frightened by the loud noise.

"Michael!" You set Charlie on the cot, pressing a kiss to his sweaty little forehead. Then you start half crawling half dragging yourself to the door. It's torture, having to listen to the impact of flesh pounding on flesh and pained groans as they echo through the chapel, and not being able to move fast enough.

"You fucking rat. You know who you're fucking messing with?"

Arms straining, you grab a large wooden crucifix from a nail on the wall, and, shifting your weight to your healthy leg, you limp toward the door, every step sending shocks of white-hot agony through the nerves in your thigh. You almost fall on your face twice.

Why didn't Michael bring fucking back up?

"I'm going to take your fucking life from you, you gypsy bastard." Hughes has Michael pinned against a pew, his hands on his neck.

Michael's eyes widen as he sees you standing behind Hughes, wooden cross in hand. His nose is bleeding. "Get your fucking hands off him, you son of a bitch."

The cross hits Hughes in the side of the head. Your swing isn't strong enough to kill him or knock him out cold, but he goes down, bringing you down with him in a violent tangle of limbs as he lands on top of you. Charlie's wails blare in your ear as you roll around the floor, struggling to unseat Hughes.

"Should have drowned you like the runts you were," he growls and slaps you across the face. Your head snaps to the side with a crack. Your vision swims. You cough as blood fills your mouth.

Suddenly, Hughes' weight is lifted off of you. Switchblade in hand, Michael has the priest by the back of his collar.

Hughes howls as the blade carves up the side rod his face. Blood pours over his hand as he holds his cheek staggers backward, collapsing on his back.

You crawl to pick up the gun he dropped, and point it at him.

Michael's chest is pumping hard as he stands over him, his teeth bared like a feral dog before it goes in for the kill. He looks like the Archangel Michael–a painting Hughes used to have hanging in his office. Unforgiving.

He doesn't react when you say his name. It's like he can't hear you through the roar of bloodlust in his ears; like you're trying to communicate with him underwater.

The door blasts open. Two middle-aged men wearing dark coats and caps storm into the chapel, guns at the ready. They're Blinders but you don't know their names. "Get up," one of them shouts at you. "I'll take him."

"No!" Michael interjects with an authority that rivals Tommy's as he wipes the blood from his nose. "This bastard is ours. Go call Finn."

The men obey his orders without protest, leaving Hughes at your mercy.

"Pin his arms," you tell Michael, face blank.

"Please, don't do this. I have money, yes. Lots of it," Hughes bleats as the gravity of his situation descends on him like settling dust.

"Shut up," Michael snarls.

"You can have it. You can have it all, but please–"

You stomp on his hand–hands that have done unspeakable things. Once, twice. On the third try, he's sobbing.

"I saved you," he screams. "I saved you. I saved you–" The rest of his words get lost in a sputtering, wet gurgle. The switchblade is plunged in his throat to the hilt. Hughes goes rigid as his last breath rattles out of him. You put down the gun.

And then it's over.

With a glazed, hard look in his eyes, Michael stands up, leaving the knife embedded in Hughes' neck. He stumbles a few steps before he sinks against the back of a pew, his knees close to his chest.

"He's gone." Your legs give out. "Michael."

He's not seeing you, his gaze on the priest's body. He absentmindedly rubs his mouth with his hand, smearing Hughes' blood all over.

You take his face between your palms.

"Henry. Henry, look at me. Look at me. It's over." A tear slips down your cheek. You touch your mouth to his, just a soft, short press of lips, thumbs gentling the taunt line of his jaw.

"Come back to me."

When you open your eyes again, your fingertips are wet with Hughes' blood and Michael's tears, and his eyes are focused on you. They're a brighter blue than usual.

He kisses your hand, right above your scar. It's a goodbye, you realize. Hughes isn't the only one who died here tonight. Henry died with him, and you're not sure what that leaves you with.

~~~

The St. Andrew's clock strikes five when you arrive at the Shelby parlor. The blocky, ashen impressions of buildings in the morning smog make Small Heath look like a ghost town.

Michael has braced a steadying arm around you, carrying a sleepy Charlie with the other.

You haven't talked on the drive home. You didn't need to.

"Oh, thank God!" Ada and Polly come running toward you with puffy, tear-spotted faces and wrangle Charlie from Michael. While Ada rushes away to phone Arrow House.

Polly pales when she sees the dried blood on you and Michael, her smile slowly sliding from her face. It's hard to overlook, the blood. It covers your hands, clothes, faces, even your hair, though you took care not to get any of it on the baby.

She doesn't ask what happened, but you can see the horror in her eyes as she embraces her son.

"She, uh, needs a doctor," Michael says and steps out of his mother's arms.

Polly takes a look at you. "There's one with Esme right now. Her water broke from all the running around. It's a boy."

"That one's getting an exciting start in life," you mutter. By now, you're almost used to the pain.

"I'll call for him," Polly says.

"And I'll make some tea." Lizzie has appeared from the kitchen. "...Or I could get some whiskey from Tommy's office? Right, whiskey it is."

Five minutes later, Lizzie has helped you into some clean clothes—one of Ada's old dresses from when she was still living above the shop—and you're lying on the couch in Michael's office, your bad leg propped up on a bunch of pillows while you nurse a bottle of booze like it's medicine.

Lizzie tactfully leaves the room when Michael enters, making up some excuse about having to take a call.

"I'm going to head out for a while." He's changed into a crisp, new suit, and his hair is combed.

You reach for his hand, curling a finger around one of his. It's a perfect fit. "Where are you going?" You hate how needy you sound. Like a god damn child scared to be left alone in the dark.

"I, uh, need to take care of something. I'll be back tonight. We can talk then."

"Fine."

"Take whatever the doctor gives you for your leg." He orders as he makes to leave.

Don't go, you want to say. _Stay_. But it won't change the truth.

Whatever you are to him now, you're not the only woman in his life. And perhaps you never will be.


	11. Chapter 11

"Y/N?" Your bedroom door opens to reveal Lizzie. "You have a visitor."

"This is unexpected," you say to Tommy's reflection in the window while Lizzie eases the door shut. You expected Michael. "Shouldn't you be with Charlie?"

The man looks like he's been dragged to hell and back. Almost losing your child does that to you, you imagine. As you look over your shoulder, you notice the leather briefcase in his hand. "Ah, I see. There's always more business to attend to. You never get to rest, do you?"

"Do I look like someone who does well being idle?"

You grin tartly. "No, I suppose, it might give you ideas."

"The leg?" Tommy asks, glancing at the bulky cast that weighs down your leg.

Doctor Naft prescribed you a week of bed rest, but you can't stand to be cooped up in bed all day, so you have relocated to the floral-patterned armchair after Lizzie helped you out of the bathtub.

"Broken."

He gives a perfunctory nod and reaches into his pocket, producing a cigarette and a matchbox. "Mind if I do?"

You open the window. "The smell lingers in the bedclothes. Lizzie hates it."

"That I've learned."

You're aware the two of them have been shacking up since Grace's death, but it's not like Tommy to acknowledge it in front of you. You're hardly friends.

Lit cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth, he puts the briefcase on your bed, unbuckles it, and drops three bundles of fifty-pound notes on the mattress.

"Three thousand for Wilderness House." Another wad of money joins the pile. "One thousand for the leg. And another for keeping Charlie safe when I couldn't."

"Five thousand pounds," you muse as you survey the small fortune he just dropped on your unmade bed.

"As we agreed."

"Well, shit." You lean back, sucking your front tooth. "You think I can get a class mansion like yours for that? When I was small, I used to dream of having a house so big, I would never have to sleep in the same bedroom twice."

Raising a brow, he cocks his head to the side. "I think you're talking about a palace."

You shrug. "No use in thinking small, is there? I reckon you know a thing or two about that, boss. It got you and me where we are today—a whole lot richer than the day before."

Tommy is quiet for a moment, then reaches into the briefcase and pointedly stacks three more bundles on top of the already substantial pile.

"It might not be enough for a palace," he says, "but it's enough to start a new life in America. Get comfortable. Buy some fast cars. More diamonds than you could wear in a lifetime."

You're not sure if you're amused or insulted by his offer. "Did Polly put you up to this?"

He doesn't deny it, which is as good a confirmation as you're going to get.

"Does she really think I'd leave because she dangles a pair of pretty earrings in front of my nose like a fucking dog with a treat?"

You exhale hard through your mouth when he doesn't answer. "Body of Christ, she does."

"She never accepted my wife either. Polly's slow to trust people who aren't family. Especially when it comes to her son."

"You fucking Shelbys. So bloody cagey." You scoff, shaking your head. "Tell her I'm not leaving Birmingham. Not for all the palaces and diamond earrings in the world."

~~~

You wake up to a knock on your door, and sound of rain pelting off the window, a darkness, bluish black as an oil spill, massing outside.

Brain muddy from sleep, you turn on the bedside lamp, dimming the brightness with the little dial. A look to the clock tells you that it's just past midnight.

Knock, knock.

Your head flops back on your pillow. "What is it, Lizzie?"

The door opens, revealing a very wet Michael, dripping all over the threshold. "Lizzie let me in," he says.

He seems changed. Hardened. Not outwardly, but on the inside. Hughes' death didn't repair what was broken, but cast the jagged edges and pieces in steel. You're not certain who this new Michael is. He probably doesn't know either. And still he came to you. Still, he needs you.

You mean to ask about Charlotte, but the look on his face deters you. Instead, you sit up and reach out a hand to him. "Come here."

He let's you strip off his jacket, and pull the shirt from his trousers, rainwater dripping from his nose on your hands as your fingers work on the knot of his tie. Then they move lower to undo his belt. There's nothing sexual about you undressing. The act feels practical and impersonal, but disarmingly intimate at the same time.

When he's standing in front of the bed in nothing but his underwear, you pull back the sheets, and turn off the lights. "Put them on the chair, and get in."

The mattress dips as he climbs into bed with you. You face each other in the dark like two ghosts, the drumming rain blocking out the sound of your even breathing.

You tell him the same thing he told Charlie before loading him into the car. "It's all right."

And, for those few minutes it takes you to fall asleep, it is.

~~~

Your room is tinged in shades of blue and gray. The rain stopped sometime after you fell asleep but the scent of petrichor still hangs cold and overripe in the morning air like unplucked fruit.

Pressing your face into the pillow, you muffle a yawn and try to roll over, but the warm body at your back and the arm banded around your midriff make moving an impossibility.

Michael's hand possessively cups your left tit over the nightgown. His nose is buried in your hair.

For an instant his fingers tighten on your breast, thumb brushing your nipple ever so slightly, and you know he's awake. You clench your thighs in response.

He must have felt your reaction because he does it again and again, the other hand drawing circles on your hip. It's getting harder to keep quiet; to resist the urge to press back against him and the hard cock you feel at your hip.

You're walking a thin line. He isn't drunk, and the sun is coming up, casting everything in a different light. The sweet innocence from last night has trickled away like the rain, and in its stead there's something else. Something darker.

Michael kisses the back of your shoulder. "Are you sure?" He murmurs, his voice raspy, deepened with sleep and arousal.

You turn your head and catch his mouth with yours in reply. The bed smells like him. Cigarettes and expensive aftershave and whatever hair product he uses to style his hair in the morning. Taking the hand that's caressing your hip bone, you guide it between your legs and into your knickers with a sigh. Michael doesn't need any instructions to find the small, sensitive nub at the top of your sex. You buck into his hand when he starts rubbing and teasing it.

"So greedy." He's smirking, the smug, arrogant bastard, the heel of his hand brushing your pubic bone.

"Michael," you whine.

He tips your chin up sharply. "What do you say?" He runs a long, brazen finger through the seam of your slit, refusing to dips inside until the sensation is almost too much.

"Fuck you," you gasp out.

His grin is wicked. "Close, but not quite what I was looking for."

"Michael, I swear, if you don't put—" The rest of your sentence ends in a keen as he slips two fingers in.

"You have to be quiet, Y/N, or Lizzie will hear." Michael hooks an arm under your uninjured knee and bends it slightly to deepen the angle. White spots dance in your vision as pleasures spikes. You moan into his kiss, crushing your mouth harder against his, hips working faster and faster, rolling into his beckoning hand.

Of course, he'd be bloody brilliant at this too. His ambition drives him to master anything he puts his mind to, so why should this be any different?

He adds another finger, and you make a sound that's embarrassingly close to a mewl. The base of your spine tingles. Your toes curl. Then, Michael crooks his finger in come-hither motion, and you're flying apart, crying into his mouth. He laces your fingers together as you ride out wave after wave of dazzling pleasure he wrings from you with his skilled hands. It makes your back arch and your head stupid.

When the last of the aftershocks rolls through your limp body, you're left staring at the white ceiling, tits heaving.

Michael pulls his hand from your core, and licks his fingers. "Sweet," he hums, and you think you're going to pass out. "Can you still talk?"

"No."

He chuckles, wiping his shiny fingers on the sheets.

"Where the hell did you learn to do that?" You ask, cheeks burning. Your head is too slow to realize that you'd rather not know about his no doubt extensive list of past bedmates.

"There's a barmaid in Nechells. Her husband had just died. She was a very thorough teacher."

"You're terrible," you groan, throwing an arm over your eyes.

"It was a mutually beneficial arrangements at the time." He gets out of bed, walking to the chair to put his clothes back on.

You struggle to sit up. "Where are you going? Don't you want to, um, finish?"

"Tommy called a company meeting at his house." He straightens the collar of his shirt in front of the cracked mirror by the washstand.

"Your mum tried to pay me off, you know."

"What?" Michael stops in the process of fastening his cufflinks, and turns around.

"She had Tommy offer me half of her cut. Three thousand pounds to get on a ship and never return."

His brows slam together. You can tell he's thinking. Processing. "And did you...?"

"Oh, yes, I'll be leaving for Istanbul in an hour, and after that, who knows. England is such a bore."

His shoulders relax marginally. "Send me a postcard when you get there."

You inspect your nails. "Well, I don't know, Michael, I might be too busy. I'd have to send out a looot of postcards—"You let out a small, delighted shriek when he pounces on you. Capturing your bare ankle, he pulls you to the end of the bed and pins your wrists to the bed, careful to keep his weight off your leg.

He tries to kiss you, but you grab him by his silk tie and tap his lip with your finger. "Run along now. Don't leave big bad Tommy waiting."

Michael's eyes dart to the clock, then back to you. "He can wait." And then his head dives under the covers.

~~~

_Pickuppickuppickuppick–_

"Come on."

You anxiously loop the phone cord around your finger while you wait for a connection. Your leg burns from the exertion of hobbling the short distance to the living room.

There's a click on the other end of the line.

"Tommy?" You hold the transmitter close to your mouth. "There's trouble over at the office, I think. Four copper cars just came down Watery Lane, heading for the shop. They're everywhere, Tommy, patrolling the streets, and there's lookouts on every street corner. I think they're searching for something."

"Someone," Tommy corrects flatly. His detatched voice scares you.

Your hand tightens reflexively around the phone stand. "Who? Tommy, what's going on? Is Michael still with you?"

There's a long pause before he speaks again. "You should have taken the money and ran."

"What do you mean?" You slam your palm on the small table in frustration. "Fucking shit, talk to me."

Dread coils in your gut as a woman's hysterical screams pierce through the ear piece. "Is that...is that Linda?"

The clamor on the other side gets louder. John is shouting for someone to let go off Esme and the baby. You can make out Michael threatening someone for laying a hand on his mother. "Tommy, what did you do?"

"There was no other way, Y/N. The people we betrayed...they won't forget what we did—what you and Michael did. They control everything."

"No, no, no, no." You shake your head even though he can't possibly see you.

The unmistakable trill of a police whistle rings in your ear. "Fuck you, Tommy Shelby. FUCK YOU."

He simply takes the abuse you hurl his way. "Don't resist, don't say anything."

"If you think I'll keep protecting you after you fuck me over—"

"Do it for Michael's sake."

"You don't get to use him against me," you snarl into the phone.

"They're coming for you," is all Tommy says before he ends the call. Static rustling fills your ear like sheeted rain.

Feeling your pulse behind your eyes, the phone slips from your hand and dangles from the tangled cord like a hanged man.

Like in the aftermath of an explosion, the shrill sounds of the police whistles still reverberate in your ears. It doesn't take long for you to realize that they're not an echo, but coming from the front door. They're already here.

"Y/N Y/L/N!"

The ringing in your skull drowns out the crash of the door being knocked down. Shouting police officers swarm into the flat, armed to the teeth with guns and batons.

It feels surreal when two of them seize you and push face first into the wall, wrenching your arms behind your back as they pat you down. As though you're hiding weapons under your thin night rail.

"Miss Y/L/N, you're hereby under arrest for aiding and abetting the wanted criminal, Michael Gray in the murder of John Hughes." You're forced to the floor. Handcuffs bite your wrists, and your heart thrashes so violently, it sounds like there's a second heartbeat under the floorboards.

"As well as for the murders of Jack Teach, George Barrowman, Edward Fawley. God help you."


	12. Chapter 12

_18 months later..._

_December 24th, 1925, Winson Green Prison_

The smoldering cigarette between your fingers is the only thing that keeps your teeth from chattering. It's fucking freezing in the mess hall. They bother to turn on the building's central heating, not even in mid-winter.

Even the food in front of you is cold. An unseasoned, stringy beef patty–still raw and frozen in the center–on a bed of soggy beans. It's a shitty change from an usually even shittier menu. A special treat to celebrate Christmas Eve, but for you, these deviations are the only way to keep track of time. Last year, they served a Christmas goose that was seriously undercooked with a side of mashed potato the color and consistency of half dried concrete.

You tap the ash off your cigarette, uncaring that some of it lands on your plate.

Another Christmas in this hellhole. Two down, twenty-eight more to look forward to. If they don't hang you first, like they did with Mary Blount. Sometimes, at night, you can still hear her screams and pleas as they dragged her from her cell toward the gallows.

"Oi, Peaky scum." A meaty hand the color of a raw bacon rind slams on the table beside you, making the few women, who are low enough in the prison's social hierarchy to have nothing to lose by associating with you, startle like hens.

Bessie O'Connor sneers at you, the mean grimace pulling at the gory scar under her eye. Her husband was a real piece of shit, which is probably why she hacked him to pieces and fed him to her Dobermans. Gave her quite the reputation among the inmates.

"Hand over the cig."

You keep on smoking. "If you want to bum a smoke you gotta barter for them like everyone else. But since there's nothing you have that I want, O'Connor, how about you fuck right off."

The woman in the cell next to yours traded the two cigarettes for a small container of tablets. The doctors give them to you under the guise of treating hysteria in female prisoners. In truth, they're drugs to make you more complacent, to keep you from bashing your head against the walls. Most of the women get addicted to them after a while. They trade their daily rations for a few of those damned tablets.

"You think you're better than us because you're one of them. Because you get privileges," Bessie grits out. "But you're damned just like the rest of us."

"Maybe, maybe not."

"That Shelby woman who saw spirits was bailed out a year ago," she taunts. The Irish woman has a square jaw that would've looked more attractive on a man.

"Seems to me them Blinder Devils have forgotten about you."

Her words are salt in an open wound. Tommy promised that he'd get you out. You kept your mouth shut like he asked, kept his secrets, lied for him even after the interrogators held your head underwater. The first year, you held out for anything—a visit, a letter, a fucking nail file baked into a birthday cake. Your only communication with the outside world occurs during the bi-monthly visits from your lawyer, Mr. Patrick, in the prison's sterile visiting room, but even then, you're talking through a glass partition. Eventually, when the news of Polly's release reached you, you stopped waiting.

Damn him. Damn them to hell, the lot of them.

"Me and the girls were discussing," Bessie goes on, her Belfast accent thick on the ears. "Is it true that Tommy Shelby passed you around his men for a bob each? Even the horses."

How terribly original. Usually, you wouldn't pass up on an opportunity to get your knuckles bloody, but the verval jabs are getting a bit stale.

You blow the smoke through your nose and into Bessie's reddening face. "What, like you and Warden Pole in the communal showers?"

"You shut your whore mouth and take that back."

Fisting her hand in your hair, she brutally yanks your head back with neck-snapping force. It feels like she's ripping bloody clumps of hair from your scalp as she drags you off the metal bench and tackles you. A pained shout barrels out of you.

Around you, the other women stop their meals to pound the tables with their fist and holler. They crowd around you like a pack of salivating hyenas

"Fight, fight, fight, fight–"

"Oi, break her face, Bess!"

"Kill 'er!"

"Bet's on the Blinder bitch. Heard she killed a fuckin' priest."

Your rib cage threatens to crack and cave under Bessie's weight as she drives her fist into your face. The woman is a head taller than you and working as a wire cutter for most of her adult life has given her considerable body strength. But you have speed and dexterity and a mean fucking streak on your side.

You crush the cigarette's burning end against the hand pinning you down, branding her with it until only ash and the crumpled rolling paper are left.

Bessie's grip loosens. Immediately taking advantage of that fact, you hook a leg around her and flip your positions, your knees digging into her chest

You put all the anger, loneliness, all the festering resentment and insanity, that have been building over the months, behind that first hit.

"Never. Try. To. Take. My. Shit. Again."

Blood spurts, christening your knuckles.

You don't hear the guards' whistles until they drag you away from Bessie O'Connor's unconscious form. All the correction officers in this sector are women, but that doesn't mean they go gentle on you. One of theit batons cracks against your back, making you stumble.

"Take what's left of O'Connor to the infirmary," Warden Braddon barks. "Get up." She shoves you forward. "You're in for it now, Y/L/N."

~~~

The prison's grid is meant to confuse and disorient possible escapees. An underground maze of identical-looking, harshly lit hallways and impenetrable doors going on for miles and miles. Five, at the very least. You counted during your last escape attempt, which had ended in Birmingham's sewers.

You already know where you're going before you reach your destination. The stainless steel plate on the door reads: Sergeant Woodes J. Burke. Inmate Counselor.

The office always smells like a potent combination of bacon sandwiches, Bushmills, and sour armpits. Burke is sitting behind his desk, the rims of his glasses digging into his fleshy cheeks, leaving red welts. He's a heavy-set man in his late forties with a bushy walrus mustache. A disgraced former inspector, dismissed from active duty for taking bribes.

"Starting fights again, Inmate 602?"

Burke never fails to call you you by the three digit number stitched into the collar of the shapeless gray prison uniform. It's part of some fucked up power play, he insists on playing. You couldn't care less.

"Just in time for our weekly meeting." You drop into the chair. "Wouldn't miss it for the world. They've become my only source of entertainment."

Burke's hairy upper lip twitches. "I should make you clean the shitters for a month for that impertinent mouth alone." He licks his lips, ogling your mouth in a way that unsettles you much more than the prospect of being elbow-deep in shit. It wouldn't be the first time.

"Now that would just make these meetings more unpleasant for both of us."

"Very good." He folds his hands over his bulging belly. "I admit, I didn't think you'd last this long in a in this place, pretty little thing like you are. Everyone has a breaking point. For some, it's the monotony, the waiting and never-ending routine that chips away at them, day after day after day, until only the shell remains. Most reach their breaking point when they see the noose. Prettiest necklace you'll ever wear." Burke sucks his tooth and chuckles. "Inmate 590 fainted at the damn sight of it. I was informed you were close with Michael Gray. You helped him murder a defenseless man of God. You're a cold-blooded little creature, aren't you?"

Your shoulders stiffen at the mention of Michael, hitching up ever so slightly.

Burke sees it too. "It wasn't his first stay with us at Winson Green, did he tell you? No? I see why he wouldn't. He got arrested for burning down a pub,l. Didn't even do it, but he wouldn't give up his cousin. Almost got five years for arson. The guards, well, they were sad to see him leave. They were very fond of him."

Your blood turns to icy clots in your veins as you catch his meaning. Lie or not, whether he oversaw it or turned a blind eye—doesn't matter—he just signed his own death warrant.

"Speaking of breaking points, maybe this is yours." Burke produces the Daily Mail from a desk drawer, pointing at a headline on the front page printed in fat, bold letters.

**BELATED JUSTICE? MURDERESS IN GRISLY TEACH MURDER CASE FACES EXECUTION 5 YEARS AFTER THE CRIME**

_After an 18-month confinement at Winson Green Prison, Y/N Y/L/N (22) is to be hung for the malicious murder of her foster father on December 25th of this year. Y/L/N's sentence was changed after new, damming evidence was brought forth against her, and—_

You set down the newspaper. Your face feels numb.

Burke smiles at you, drumming his thick fingers on his desk. "You see why, at this point, punishing you for roughing up an inmate would be a tad excessive. No use in correcting behavior if you won't live to see the new year."

"I want to make a phone call."

"The jury has decided. There's nothing your lawyer can do for you now."

You don't plan on calling Mr. Patrick. "I know my rights. Get Tommy Shelby on the phone."

"Make your peace with God, girl. He's the only one who can help you."

"Tommy Shelby—"

"—isn't God." He turns to the warden. "Get her out of my sight."

Hands grab you from behind and start hauling you out of the office when the phone mounted on Burke's desk starts ringing.

"What?" He barks into the transmitter, irritated by the interruption. His gaze snaps to you as the person on the other end speaks. "No, he can't do that. The sentence is final. It can't be done.... But the newspapers for tomorrow have already been printed.... The Lord Chamberlain? Yes, I apologize, sir. Goodbye." The soft ladder of his chin wobbles as he hangs the ear phone on the fork protruding from the stand.

"What happened, Sergeant?" The female warden asks, unsure.

"Take Miss Y/L/N back to her cell. She will be released within the hour," Burke grunts. " It seems Mr. Shelby takes care of his devils, after all."

~~~

There are no personal belongings for you to collect. The cell you called home these past eighteen months is three paces wide and four paces long. There's a narrow bunkbed—a two inch mattress over a slab of steel welded to the wall—and a cracked sink that only sputteres brown water for less than two minutes a day. No windows.

You can immediately tell that something is different when the cell door clangs shut behind you.

There's an envelope on the bed. You never get mail. Someone—one of the guards—must have put it there while you were at mess. It's safe to assume that Tommy has one or two of them in his pocket.

Sitting on the rock-hard bedding, you pick up the envelope. Air mail. You're no longer in contact with anyone from America.

_Ms. Y/N Y/L/N_

_Winson Green Rd_

_Winson Green Prison, Cell block 5-A_

_Birmingham_

_Great Britain_

You rip the side of the envelope, your hands clammy from narrowly escaping death as you pull out a Christmas card. It falls open, revealing a black handprint harshly contrasted against the white card.

_Merry Christmas to you and your family_

_From Luca Changretta & Family_

"Fuck."

Dropping the card like it's a live rattlesnake, you jump up from the bed so fast your head spins. The card falls to the floor. The black hand seems to mock you. You back away until your back hits the bars of your cell.

Changretta. The people who killed Grace. Sabini's cousins. You remember that night at the Garrison, two years ago. The score hasn't been settled, then.

"Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck."

There is no peace waiting for you outside Winson Green's metal walls, only blood and vengeance. You might prefer the noose, after all.

~~~

"The uniform is prison property," the intake officer drones as she pushes a small cardboard box, labelled with your name and registration number, through the cubicle's window. "The civilian clothes you were wearing at the time of your arrest are in this box along with all your recorded personal effects."

The box contains exactly one item. A short chemise. You pull it out, pinching the flimsy thing between your thumb and forefinger. Yellowish white stains stiffen the once pristine chemise in spots. Disgust rolls through you.

Fucking pigs.

"It's either that or you're leaving here naked," the officer says firmly. "Now strip."

You swallow. Cold air hits your bare chest as the uniform tangles around your feet. Naked, you step out of it and lift your chin, holding your head high. "So, where's the exit?"

The woman raises her thinly plucked eyebrows but doesn't comment on the bruises spotting your rib cage as she points you toward a sally port. Two stony-faced female guards unlock it and rush you through the door, leading you down a long gray corridor. There's no light at the end.

You can only hope that Tommy send someone to pick you up. Hitchhiking is never a good idea, but doing it with your tits out seems like a sure way to end up trussed like a Christmas goose in some sick fuck's car trunk.

For the first time in eighteen months, you breathe in your a breath of fresh air. Or as fresh as it can be this close to the smoky stacks of a Small Heath. So polluted with coal dust and smoke you can can practically feel the future promise of lung cancer coat the roof of your mouth.

One of the guards shows the release order to the officer at the front gate. He nods and waves you through, and then, just like that, you're out. Free.

A black Bentley is waiting out front. It has the Shelby Company Limited stench of money all over it. You step into the beam of headlights, dimly aware of the gate closing behind you with a metallic clang. The gate that separates hell from purgatory. Good fucking riddance.

The door on the Bentley's passenger side opens and Ada gets out, dressed to the nines in five inch high heels and American designer clothes like she just stepped off Broadway.

Her rouged smile falls when she gets a good look at the new you. Even in the dark, you can see the pity in her eyes.

Your hair is shorter than before–the guards shaved it off last spring because of a lice infestation among the prisoners–and your face looks sharper. Hardened. You would hardly recognize yourself.

"Oh, sweetheart." Ada's already stripping off her cocoon fur coat as she hurries toward you. "Driver, turn around."

You appreciate her gesture of trying to protect your modesty, but at this point, you're afraid there's not much left of it.

"Right bastards, sending you out into the cold like that, poor thing."

"The alternative was worse," your assure her. Your shivers subside as she wraps the soft furs around your shoulders and rubs her hands down your arms. The coat smells like her perfume. Something light and floral. "It's good to see a friendly face."

"I bet." Ada smiles at you. "Go on, let's get you inside. You can change there. My bags are still in the car. I got off the ship just this morning."

"And you're already runnings errands for Tommy?" The backseat is softer than anything you've felt in over a year. You let your hands run over the buttery leather. "You're driving his car, so, I take it, you're still the Head of Acquisitions?"

Ada gives the driver the signal to start the engine. "I am. Spent the last year in Boston overseeing business there."

"What about John and Arthur?" With her permission, you zip open one of her travelling bags, select a random dress and pull it over your head, the coat acting as a privacy screen. You expected that, after getting used to the uniform's scratchy, irritating fabric, your rough skin would chafe against the fine organdy and taffeta, but the feeling is divine.

"A lot has changed since you were gone, Y/N. Arthur and John have retired to the country. Arthur's is raising chickens in his backyard."

You laugh. It comes out rusty. "Fuck, you're serious."

"They haven't officially resigned from the board, but they refuse to speak or be in the same room as Tommy Shelby OBE. It's just me, Lizzie, and Michael, now."

Your heart jolts. You're not surprised Michael is still working for Tommy. He's his golden heir; Shelby Company Ltd's bright future.

"Hold on, Ada, did you say 'Tommy Shelby OBE'? You've got to be fucking joking."

Ada rolls her eyes, half shaking her head. "You know Tommy, he's never satisfied."

"We went to prison and that prick gets an order of chivalry out of it? What's next, a fucking knighthood in exchange for selling his soul to Winston Churchill?"

"I'm sure it has crossed his mind at least once."

You scoff and let your gaze drift out of the window. Not that there's much to see at night. A coroner's vehicle passes you on the road.

"Does he think his connections with the PM will save him now that the Sicilian mafia is coming for our heads?"

Ada's head swivels around, her eyes—so much warmer than her brother's—wandering to the driver, who's been discreetly silent the entire time. Her meaning is clear. Not here. The driver might be working for the Shelbys, but this is a time when everyone's loyalties are brought into question.

Up ahead, the shadows melt away, and the stately Jacobethan structure of Arrow House comes into view.

A new housekeeper by the name of Francis lets you in. Mary, bless her soul, probably ran for the hills screaming after a majority of her employer's family was put on trial for murder and sedition. Good for her.

The house smells like gingerbread and fir and a wonderful, mouth-watering smell wafts up from the kitchens.

"Is he expecting guests?" You asks as Ada and you follow Francis to Tommy's office. She truly knocked herself out with the Christmas decoration. Vines of red and gold tinsel hang from every piece of furniture.

"He does indeed." Francis nods. "He's invited Johnny Dogs and his family, miss. I was informed that his people are quite... unconventional."

"Goodness gracious," Ada says low under her breath as Francis raps her knuckles on the door and disappears into the office. "Let's hope the house is still standing by Boxing Day."

"Mr. Shelby, it's your sister and a Miss Y/L/N."

"I know. Send them in."

Your hands flex at the sound of Tommy's cool voice, an old, familiar anger licking up your spine like wildfire.

Tommy leans against his desk, pouring three glasses of whiskey. "I've had a card, Ada. I'm guessing Arthur and John have had one as well."

"Hello, Tommy," Ada sighs and kisses his cheek in greeting. "Oh why, my journey was pleasant, thanks for asking."

A blast of heat sails toward you as you walk past the crackling fireplace.

Tommy clears his throat. He holds a glass out to you. A peace offering. "Welcome home, Y/N. We're glad to have you back. Let's make peace, eh?"

Your nostrils flare as you look between his face and the proffered glass.

"Eat shit," you growl and punch Tommy Shelby OBE in the face.

The glass shatters on the floor. Francis let's out a shriek.

"Eighteen months, Tommy. You let me rot in there for eighteen months." Huffing like a mad bull, you raise your fist to swing at him again. He dodges it, holding up his hands in a pacifying gesture as his cheek turns red with the imprint of your knuckles. It only makes you madder.

"They made me clean the shithouse with a fucking toothbrush." You shove his chest.

"Y/N, calm down and listen to me. I would have gotten you out of there sooner, but there was no—"

"No way?" A laugh is pulled from your throat like barbed wire. "Don't give me that shite. There's always another way for Tommy Shelby." The Black Hand lying atop a pile of unopened mail catches the corner of your eye, and you can feel yourself deflate. A headache is forming between your brows. "We're all fucked anyway."

"You've had one too?"

You glare at him, massaging your knuckles. "Funny how I'm always getting dragged into your messes, isn't it? When this is over, and we're still breathing by some fucking miracle, I want a damn raise. And I want the money you owe me."

"You will. It's in the cellar."

You nod, taking the whiskey he poured for himself. It's a ceasefire.

"This going to get ugly fast, Tommy," you say. "I've seen the bodies floating in Hudson River, if you can even call them that. They cut off their lips and noses and ears, even the fucking eyelids. Makes it harder for the coppers to identify them. The New York Mafia makes the Peaky Blinders look like a bloody knitting circle. We should all be running."

"We're not going to run." Tommy rounds his desk and braces his hands against it. "I've spoken to Moss. He says that Changretta is a soldier for the Spinietta family, which means that he'll have men with him; professional men. They usually operate in units of around ten. Moss is checking Cunard records to see if they're already in England."

"They are," you cut in. "The Sabinis are their cousins. They might join forces, or tear each other to pieces after they're done with us."

"So, boss, in light of the changed circumstances, what are your orders?" Ada asks, crossing her arms.

"Changretta knows where we all live. If we stay out in the open, isolated, he'll pick us off one by one. We need to be together in a place even they won't dare to come."

Ada stares at him in disbelief. "You mean, back home?"

Tommy sits down. "Within a four-mile radius of the Garrison, every man is a guard and soldier for us," he rattles off, waving his hand. There's something different about him. It's behind the eyes. Something that wasn't there before.

"I'm calling a family meeting. Charlie Strong's yard, Boxing Day. Finn's already there. You tell Polly and Michael and explain. They'll have had cards as well. I'll deal with John and Arthur."

He takes two sleek Webleys from his desk drawer and hands them to you. "Stay alert."

You load the gun with a series of clicks. It's good to have a gun in your hand again.

A familiar fit, at last


	13. Chapter 13

You doze in the car with the gun resting on your thighs like a faithful lapdog.

Harborne is a forty-five minute drive from Arrow House. It's one of those orderly, well-off, suburban neighborhoods where everyone has the same glossy, trimmed hedges and competes in Britain's Best Lawn competitions every year. Not a place you'd associate with Polly Gray, but that's the idea, you suppose.

The car parks under a streetlight, and the driver takes out a newspaper while he waits for you.

"Before we go in," Ada says as the two of you walk up the driveway. "Don't be alarmed by what Polly might say to you."

You light a cigarette, cupping a hand over the tiny flame to shield it from the night breeze. "Why? What is she going to say?"

Ada sighs. "She hasn't been the same since she came home. She's seeing spirits now."

"Spirits? What, like ghosts?" You don't exactly believe in that kind of spooky nonsense. Not one bit to be exact.

"I'm not sure what she sees. Just...be prepared for anything."

You don't tell her that you'd never face Polly Gray unprepared anyway.

A crash comes from the house, followed by raised, heated voices. You and Ada trade alarmed looks, rushing to the door which stands wide open.

_"You can move in with me and I'll help you!"_ The shock of hearing Michael's voice after such a long time hits you in the gut like a baseball bat, winding you.

_"Fuck off! Fuck off, Thomas Shelby, fuck off."_

_'It's me, mum, it's me."_

_"I just want you to stop, just stop. I just want the tablets."_

_"Mum, this has got to stop. Tommy said to believe in spirits with you, but I can't. I can't—"_

"Hello Polly," Ada says loudly as she marches across the threshold. "Hello Michael. Merry Christmas."

The two freeze mid-argument. Michael grabs his head with both hands, swearing under his breath. He hasn't noticed you yet. You're still standing on the porch, unable to pull your eyes away from him.

His time at Winson Green hasn't changed him as much as it changed you. At least, not on the outside. He still looks the picture of professionalism and class, smartly dressed even when he's out of the office.

"Fuck," Polly whispers, voice reedy and thin. "I spent the whole day tidying up. I wanted it to look nice."

Ada goes to embrace her comfortingly. "Why, Pol, it's only me and Y/N."

"Y/N?" Michael cuts in, sharp as a whip, as if he's angry to hear your name. Then his gaze falls on you. "Tommy got you out."

"He did," you force out.

He doesn't sweep you off your feet and rains kisses on you like some fairytale prince. You work through the knot of disappointment in your throat, telling yourself that this was to be expected. A lot can change in eighteen months. Perhaps, he found someone else. You weren't exclusive at the time of your arrest; everything between you still so fresh and raw and undefined. Nothing but loose ends.

"No, I don't want her here," Polly mutters, her dark eyes bitter. "The spirits don't go near her. She's bad."

"Mum."

You step off the porch into the house, closing the door behind you. "You should think about getting a better lock, Polly. This one won't keep out a drunk picklock, much less assassins."

"Assassins?" Polly's face goes pale.

"Today, everyone in the family, including Y/N, received one of these." Ada opens her red croc bag and shows Polly and Michael the Christmas card with the Black Hand drawn in thick black ink.

"What does it mean?" Michael asks evenly.

You tap your cigarette on the ashtray on the table. "Means we're about as likely to survive the holidays as a fucking Christmas turkey. It's the New York Mafia's way of sending their regards before they send us straight to hell."

Ada puts a gloved hand on Polly's shoulder. "Tommy's called a family meeting at Charlie's Yard. He wants you both to come."

Polly flinches away. "No, no, I will not see that man. You can't make me."

"Mum, be reasonable. If the Italians put us on a hit list, we need to be together in a place where we can keep each other safe."

Polly is slipping again, hands wringing. You've seen enough prisoners act like this when they ran out of tablets to recognize the early signs of withdrawals.

"Ada, get her upstairs to calm down. Draw her a bath. I'll put on some tea," you say quietly as you slip into the adjoining kitchen.

"Come on, Pol."

"Don't talk about me like I'm not here," Polly snaps, but she doesn't resist when Ada gently steers her up the stairs.

In the kitchen, you fill a kettle with water and put it on the stove to boil. Raising yourself on your tiptoes, you reach for the tea caddy in the kitchen cabinet, fingers straining.

Pain shoots up your knee. Your muscles seize and cramp and your bad leg gives out under you. "Argh, shitting fuck."

A hand on your waist steadies you as the other reaches over your shoulder, takes the tin canister, and sets it on the countertop in front of you.

"You're hurt," Michael's voice is carefully devoid of emotion, his chest brushing your back as he pulls back his arm.

"It's nothing," you gasp. "Just a twinge."

"Liar."

Releasing a breath, you start preparing the tea. "It never healed properly. The guards broke the cast on my first day. They laughed while they did it."

"Y/N." He makes you turn around and face him. You continue to stare at his tie, refusing to tip up your chin to meet his gaze.

"Y/N, look at me." He plucks the cigarette from the corner of your mouth and flicks it in the kitchen sink. "I wasn't allowed to visit."

"I know."

"We—I tried to send letters through Mr. Patrick, but they had him searched."

You nod, hand tightening around the empty mug. The kettle whistles, steam sputtering from its opening. "Anything else? Your mum needs her tea."

"Hey." His hand finds purchase in your hair, giving the nape of your neck a squeeze. "Forget about the fucking tea, Y/N."

"Stop it. You don't have to do this—" You raise your hands between you, but don't push him away. Closing your eyes, you take a fortifying breath. "I know time didn't stop for you while I was away. I don't expect things between us to be the same. People move on. I won't stand in the way or hold it against you if there's someone else—"

His mouth crashes desperately against yours. The cups in the cabinet rattle as your shoulders hit the cupboard. Your noses bump together. You gasp his name, head falling back as you open your mouth under the hot, coaxing pressure of his lips and tongue.

Michael is relentless, crowding you into the counter. His fingertips leave a toe-curling path of fire in their wake, and your blood turns sticky and sweet as he licks into your mouth, traces the contours of your cupid's bow.

Grabbing the back of your thighs, he hikes you up his body, your legs cinching around his waist, and deposits you on the countertop. You attack his neck with your lips, hands smoothing over his leanly muscled back, but he hooks his finger around your chin, his face a breath away from yours.

"There was no one," he says, slowly pronouncing each syllable for emphasis. "Do you understand?" He rubs thumb across your kiss-swollen lower lip as if he's trying to make the unspoken words sink in. Words he doesn't know how to say.

You slant your mouth over his, tearing at the brass buttons of his waistcoat. His hands ruck up the dress to your hips.

You're working on removing his belt when a delicate, feminine cough makes you hastily detangle yourself from each other.

"Your tea is ready." Ada stands in the doorway with an amused, knowing little smile.

Fastening his belt with a glare, Michael steps out from between your thighs and clears his throat.

Flustered, you slide off the counter. "What is it, Ada?"

"Tommy's on the phone. He wants to talk to his heir apparent. Apparently, things changed."

With a last look at you, Michael stalks from the kitchen.

Cheeks aflame, you take the tea kettle from the stove. If there's been a change of plans you won't need it anymore.

"So, this explains the stain on the carpet in my guest room" Ada smirks, lifting her dark, pencilled-in eyebrows as you follow Michael into the hall.

"They're coming today," he says, putting the phone down harder than necessary.

So, much for your newly won freedom. Out of the frying pan and into the fucking fire.

"How does he know?" Ada frowns. "Did they come for him and Charlie?"

"He didn't say, but we have to leave now."

"Grand, there goes my bath and nap."

Michael glowers at you. Clearly, humor is not very appreciated at the moment. "Tommy says to get you and mum to the boat yard," he says to Ada.

"I'll go wake her. She's asleep upstairs. Do the others know?"

"Arthur, Linda and the baby are on their way, but he couldn't reach John. Y/N and I will go to his place and get them out. He hopes that you'll be able to talk some sense into Esme."

"Me?" Your forehead creases. "Why would she listen to me?"

He slides his hands into the pockets of his trousers. "She's made it sufficiently clear that she thinks of me and Ada as traitors. But you and her were friends, no?"

"We haven't seen each other in almost two years," you say skeptically. "Besides, this is Esme we're talking about. She has trouble trusting her own mother."

"Well, then you better be convincing. We leave in ten minutes."

~~~

"Come on." Michael slams the car horn at the hay cart blocking the bumpy road ahead.

You lift your cheek from the overcoat bunched under your head to form a warm, comfy barrier between your body and the cold car window. It takes real effort not to press your nose into the coat's woollen fabric to inhale his scent. He changed his aftershave.

John lives almost an hour hour out of Birmingham, in a sleepy, rural area north of Lichfield. Enough time for you to catch up on some much needed sleep.

"Fucking move!" Frustration makes blood mount to Michael's face as he clenches the steering wheel. You slide a hand across the seat and clamp it over his knuckles.

"We'll get there. Tommy bought us some time."

"You trust him?"

"I trust us." You squeeze his hand for emphasis. "And I trust the Peaky Blinders."

"What's left of them."

The cart clears the road. Michael hits the accelerator.

As the Bentley shoots past the obstacle, you make eye contact with the old farmer who's leading the draft horse. He doffs his cap, his smile toothless, his balding head looking like a mold-spotted apple. Then, he's out of sight and the car is speeding down the country road.

Shivering from inside, you shift in your seat and pull Michael's coat over your legs to lend you some warmth. Something small clinks in its pocket. Two blue glass bottles roll into your palm. Pinching one between your fingers, you hold it against the light to survey the white, finely milled powder inside.

"What happened to not partaking?"

"Keeps me sharp," he admits, locking his eyes on the road. "I need it to stay awake."

"You can't stay awake forever."

"Yeah, but when I sleep, I keep seeing that fucking noose." He rolls his shoulders as if the space in the car suddenly got too small. "In my dreams, they bring me to that white room. Just me. No John or Arthur. But it's not me who's hanging from that rope, Y/N. They make me watch when they pull the lever. Over and over and over. So yes, I take it when the screams get too loud, so what?"

"I wasn't judging."

"I know." He turns off the engine and gets out, letting a blast of winter air into the car. "Come, I can't wait to get this over with."

"John! Esme! Hello?"

You round the house. Michael looks comically out of place in the country with his Savile Row suit and tie and polished Oxfords.

Compared to Arrow House, John's house is modest in size and has a certain rugged charm complete with weeds and wildflowers. You hear wind chimes as you open the gate and trudge behind Michael through the half-frozen mud. The thought of Esme and the kids making them and tying them to the porch with colorful strings brings a wisp of a smile to your lips. Kitty must be old enough to walk by now.

The click of a gun being cocked sounds close to your ear.

"Will you fucking look at that." A slightly dishevelled-looking John hangs out of the building's side door, still dressed in his pyjamas.

"My brother finally came to his senses and broke his favorite little helper out, eh?" Flashing you a shite-eating grin, he props the rifle on his shoulder. "You look like they put you through fuckin' hell. Didn't they feed you in there?"

"Still better-looking than you, John Boy," you say sweetly, saluting him with a finger.

Two spaniels bound past him, wagging their tails and barking excitedly. You get on your knees to scratch one of them behind the floppy ears.

Michael scowls in disgust when the other one attempts to jump on him and lick his face.

"Jip, Pilot, get in," John calls off his dogs and starts walking in the direction of the house. "Come in, have some food. Breakfast is still on the table. Esme will lose her fucking shit when she sees you. The kids have been asking after you—"

"It's serious, John," Michael urges as he falls into step beside him. "The vendetta starts today. Tommy wants everyone at Charlie's Yard."

"Let them come. I'm not afraid of that greasy-haired wop in my own fucking home."

Damn him and his Shelby stubbornness.

"It's not just Luca Changretta." You stamp after him. "He brought men. Brothers, cousins, uncles. Men for who Vincente Changretta's murder is just as personal."

"It's fucking Christmas day, Y/N, what's gonna happen, eh? The Changrettas are Catholic."

"I don't think the New York Mafia care about the birth of Baby Jesus, John," you bite out.

He just shrugs, hand on the front door. "Luca was in school with us. Got pushed around a lot by the older boys. They hung him from a tree and he pissed himself. Wanna hear the funniest fucking thing? It was Tommy who cut him down. No, Luca Changretta doesn't have the guts to carry out a vendetta against the Peaky-fucking-Blinders."

"We aren't the Peaky-fucking-Blinders unless we're together," Michael raises his voice. "Just come to the meeting and—"

The front door swings open and Esme storms out in her floaty, bohemian dressing gown, barefoot and furious.

"Tell Tommy Shelby that we can take care of ourselves," she hisses and stabs a finger into Michael's chest, baring her teeth at him.

"Hello, Esme," he sighs. "Can we come in?"

"No."

John mutters something to Esme in Shelta. Her head whips around to you.

"You're on his side, then?" She accuses. "Even after he left you to rot in that horrible place?"

You meet her spitfire temper with your own. "Forget about bloody sides, Esme. This isn't about old grudges. Believe me, I had half a mind to kill him when I saw him last night."

"And yet here you stand as his fucking mouthpiece," she counters.

So much for Tommy's theory that you might be able to sway her.

"This is getting us nowhere. By all means, waste time squabbling. I'm going back to the car," you announce. "You can join me when you're ready see some common fucking sense."

Swinging around, you march down the brick pathway, Ada's high heels clacking against the aged stone. You've barely turned your back on them when the shouting continues. From the corner of your eye, you see the horse cart from earlier pull up in front of the gate and stop. The old man is nowhere to be seen. Something moves behind the hay.

There's no time to formulate a plan or even coherent thoughts.

Time warps. Everything that follows happens in a slowed, distorted haze. Stasis.

Ada's dress floats around you as you spin on your heels. The bales of hay are knocked off to reveal four men armed with assault rifles. Feeling like your heart is bursting from your mouth, you scream Michael's name in warning.

"Get in the fucking house!" John yells and loads his gun, facing the assassins like he faces everything else in life–head-on and unafraid.

Michael pushes Esme toward the safety of the house and looks over his shoulder. You've never seen such wild fear in his eyes.

"Y/N, stay back!"

His body shudders as the first bullet rips into his chest.

_Pop pop pop pop_ —The spent cartridges hit the pathway at his feet like marbles.

John on his back. His shirt hanging in bloody shreds. Michael. Falling.

Red mist washes over your eyes, blots out your vision. The pavement soaks through the front of your dress. You didn't even notice that you went down, your hands covering your ears. They ring like the St. Paul Cathedral's bells.

John picked off two out of four men before the rifle dropped from his limp fingers.

Scrambling to your feet, you pull out the Webley and start blasting. No cover. No retreat. Just your finger on the trigger and the shock-induced adrenaline numbing your body.

You feel absolutely nothing when the second shot hits one of the assassins in the cheek, shattering his cheekbone and making his face collapse.

" _Merda_!" The other assassin curses hectically as his gun misfires. A stream of Italian leaves his mouth. He curses again.

You squeeze the trigger for a third time, catching him in the shoulder as the cart begins to pull away.

Part of you wants to give chase, but the bone-chilling sound of Esme wailing pierces through the scarlet fog that hangs over your mind.

She's crouched over John, cradling his head to her heart. A small, tinny trickle of red dribbles from the corner of his mouth and mingles with Esme's tears. Fucking dead. Just like that.

You stumble. Michael has collapsed not far behind John. The red fog almost descends over your eyes again at the sight of him.

"No, no, Michael." You fall to your knees beside him and turn him on his back, uncaring that his blood coats your hands.

His eyes are open, but unfocused. Fading. Your thumb drags blood across his cold cheek. His chest rises and falls harshly. "No, don't go to sleep. Don't close your eyes, okay."

A flash of movement to your right has you aim the gun with wide, wild eyes.

John's oldest, Sally, stands in the door, pale as a sheet. Drawn to the window by the noise, her siblings' round little faces are pressed against the glass, peering outside.

"Don't let them come outside," you shout. "Go, quickly, call an ambulance."

Sally flinches and skitters back into the house.

"Help is coming. Don't go, all right? Stay with." Your voice breaks and your head drops forward on his shoulder. "Don't leave me."


	14. Chapter 14

Esme fights when they come to take John's body away. Pounding her fists on the paramedic's chest, she screams and spits a litany of Romany curses at them when they tell her that there's nothing they can do; that no one can survive that many bullets to the chest. Not even John Shelby.

You don't remember much after that, just fragments. The world around you is numb and muted as if your head's underwater.

The ride to the hospital. Nurses running toward you, rushing Michael to the emergency operating room. Him bleeding out on a white gurney, his bullet-shred body taunt with pain. You begging them to save his life.

You talk to the medical staff on autopilot, making up a cover story. A family feud, you say. Not unusual around Christmas.

"Who are you to the patient?" They ask. You don't know what to say.

Tommy and Polly arrive not long after. Polly's crying. You haven't she'd a single tear.

"Let me through. That's my son."

"Ma'am, we really need you to wait outside and let the doctors do their work."

"You can't keep me from my son!"

Michael's blood is like sticky glue between your hands. His eyes are screwed shut, but his mouth trembles open. "...Y/N..."

"I'm here, Michael. I'm here."

"Don't go...so...cold..."

"What is she doing here?" Polly pushes you out of the way, slotting her hand in Michael's. "Out! She isn't family."

"Pol—" Tommy tries to reason with her, but you're already leaving.

"No, I'll go." You can feel the shaking start to set in. It starts as a slight, innocuous quiver in the fingers. A buzzing in your teeth. A light layer of cold sweat forming on your back.

Outside the operating room, there's mayhem—a confusing swirl of activity. Blinders are stationed at every door. Some look even younger than Finn. Fucking green behind the ears. Is that your army, Tommy?

You walk down the hall until the noise falls away. Sliding down the wall, you fold into a shaking heap. Your head falls against your knees. Up close, you can see the traces of blood in the creases of your knuckles.

A scream builds in the back of your throat, starting as a deep-seated pain in the muscles of your jaw, but you ruthlessly force it back with your hands. You won't allow yourself to break. Not yet anyway.

Time crawls, the minutes and seconds sticking together like the wet pages of a book. Michael's coat hangs heavy over your shoulders. You dip a hand into the pocket and close it around a small blue bottle.

Maybe just this once? To make it through the rest of the day without feeling like your chest is splitting wide open.

You uncork the bottle with clumsy, trembling fingers and upend its contents on the back of your hand, not bothering to cut it into lines.

"Sixteen bullets."

Tommy is staring at the vinyl hospital floor with a tightly contained, expressionless face that leaves no room for grief. You hastily wipe your hand on the coat.

"Twelve for John. Four for Michael. Two of them went through John first," he recounts matter-of-factly.

"I, er, killed one," you sniff. "John shot two. The last one escaped, but he's injured."

Tommy jerks his head once. "Good, that means there are only eleven left for us to deal with."

"Is he going to make it?" Your voice sounds dead to your ears.

"He's fighting, but the doctors can't say. Polly is sure he'll make it. The spirits told her."

You never wanted to believe in ghosts so badly.

Standing just a few feet from the no smoking sign, he takes out a cigarette from his tin, offering you one too. You accept The strike of the match draws attention to the lines of wear around his eyes. He lost a brother today.

Fucking shit, John Boy. Inviting smoke into your lungs, you close your eyes and rub the aching spot beneath your collar bone.

"Sixteen fucking bullets, Tommy," you mutter. "We'll pay them back tenfold. We'll kill them all."

He says nothing for a while. Smoke pours from your mouths and envelops you in a thick, private shroud.

"I'm calling a meeting at four. Be there."

"Tommy, about John—"

His head twitches. He clears his throat, and turns to leave. "Phone Lizzie and tell her to pick you up."

"Tom."

"Don't be late. And throw away the fookin' cocaine. I need you with a clear head, eh?"

~~~

John's funeral is on Boxing Day. You're not there to see the flames claim his body. Neither is Esme, who packed the kids and left for Sainte-Marie before the first pall of smoke could sail into the bleak winter sky.

You can't see Charlie's boatyard from the window in Michael's hospital room, but the burn behind your eyes keeps you awake.

You're wearing the black mourning dress Lizzie lent you, a rosary's wooden edges digging into your palm. It makes you look like a widow at his bedside, holding a wake that only you and the two Blinders at the door attend as Michael teeters between life and death.

There's no color in his lips. His skin pale and drawn tight across his cheekbones. Bandages wrap across his shallowly moving chest. Tubes go in and out of him, pumping his body with fluids and pain killers to keep him from crossing that vital threshold.

A nurse comes in every two hours to change the dressing and give him something for a painless sleep. Every time that door opens, your hand twitches toward the gun hidden under a hat on the bedside table. You told Tommy to send more men to watch the hospital, which turned out the be the first and only thing you and Polly could see eye to eye on.

Cheek nestled against Michael's arm, you flinch when the back of his finger feathers over your hair; the touch so light, it feels accidental.

Your chin tips up to see him move. "Michael?"

His eyes are still mostly closed—darkish bruises pressing over his twitching eyelids—but he produces a rough, affirmative sound in the back of his throat. His parched, dehydrated lips move silently.

Clasping the hand that reached for you, you press it to your cheek. "Shhh shhh, easy. Don't try to speak yet. It's okay. You just had a surgery."

"Ww...a..te...r."

"Water? Right, of course." You bring the glass to his lips, supporting his hand with yours and catching an errant dribble on his chin. His throat convulses around the tiny sip, and he coughs a bit.

When his lids peel apart, his eyes are glassy with pain and laudanum. They look more green than blue.

"There you are," you whisper. "I didn't..." The ball of emotion that sits squarely in your throat tightens. A tear runs over the back of his hand. "I—oh god—I was so scared that you might..."

"Y...ou...?"

"Don't worry about me. I'm fine."

"Esme and the children?" His body is fighting every word, his husky voice snagging on every syllable.

"Alive and unharmed."

"...John?"

Your gut twinges.

He knows the answer, you know he does, but he needs to hear it from you.

"I'm sorry, Michael. There was nothing...he was already gone when the ambulance arrived." The words burn in your throat like a swallowed knife.

"I know. I saw him leave." He stares up at the sterile white ceiling. "He didn't want to go. He wasn't like Tommy. He wasn't ready."

For a moment, the only sounds in the room are Michael's labored breathing and the steady drop, drop, drop of the infusion dripping from the IV bag.

"You're not ready either, you hear me? You're going to get better," you rush out, stroking back his hair. "There was a moment in the operating room when I thought I was going to lose you."

"Y/N."

You gulp hard. "And I know you might not feel the same way, and that's all right. You're my best friend. Always have been. But I can't bloody breathe around you, Michael. And when I saw you lying on that operating table, I thought to myself 'I never said it out loud'."

"You didn't have to." He hooks his finger around your thumb and tugs. "Come here."

"Your stitches—"

"I don't give a fuck about the stitches. C'mere." He tugs again, and you let him pull you on the narrow hospital bed, arms and legs tangling together like wound strings. Your head is tucked under his chin, your cheek flipped against his chest, ear pressed above his heart. It's beating faster than normal.

You know he won't say it back. Not now. Not like this. Not with words, even though he knows all the fancy ones.

"I bought a house," he says instead, his chest lifting beneath you as he speaks.

"Yeah?" You run your nose over his Adam's apple, and press a kiss to the razor nick under the hinge of his jaw. You hate the smell of hospital clinging to his skin.

"It's not Arrow House or a cottage by the sea," he murmurs. "But it's close to the office. Lizzie can give you the keys."

You crane your head to look at him. "You mean, live there together?"

"I won't be leaving this place anytime soon, but I want you where it's safe. You won't be alone there."

"Please don't make me be roommates with your mother."

The corner of his mouth quirks. "I was going to say, I have a housekeeper." You can tell sleep is closing in on him again. His eyes have already fallen shut, and his breathing starts to even out.

Rapid footsteps approach. They stop abruptly. Polly is standing in the door, tension rolling off of her like steam. The slightly stale scent of cold smoke permeates the air around her. She brought flowers. Yellow pansies.

"You're back from the funeral?" You ask, watching her from the corner of your eye.

"Funeral, my arse. It was a fucking sham, a trap," Polly sniffs disdainfully. "Why are there no bloody guards in here? The two in the hell are getting drunk on Gordon's."

You stand up without stirring Michael. "Because I sent them outside."

"You had no right—"

"I'm awake, Mum," Michael interrupts, cracking one eye open.

Polly shoulders past you. "You shouldn't be talking. The doctors said they gave you enough to knock out a horse." She arranges the blankets over him, tucking the edges of the sheet under him like he's nine years old.

"You're fussing," he complains obligatorily, but you know, in truth, he enjoys the attention.

"I'm your damn mother, Michael Joseph Gray. It's my god-given right to fuss. Are you in pain?" Polly looks over your shoulder at you. "Be a dear and send one of the nurses in on your way out."

Right. Time to go.

~~~

The house Michael bought is on the nicest, least grimy street Small Heath has to offer, but still in walking distance to Watery Lane. Safe territory. It's a two-storey terrace tucked away between a busy, respectable pub and a post office. Tommy's men are positioned at both ends of the street, blending into the dark brick buildings. You don't know them.

A robust older woman with stiff gray hair, who dresses like it's 1910, bustles toward you as soon as you let yourself into the entryway. She introduces herself as Mrs. Parker, Michael's housekeeper.

"You're her," she says as she takes your coat and hat, and hangs them on the peg on the wall.

"Her?" You ask, befuddled.

"The girl he's been waiting for."

"He talked about me?"

Mrs. Parker shakes her head no. Her gray curls barely move. "Oh no, Mr. Gray keeps to himself for the most part. He's a private young man. But I took your clothes to the laundress once a month to keep them in good condition. They're in the upstairs bedroom if you want to change."

"That was, um, very thoughtful of you."

"All on Mr. Gray's orders." She pauses. "Just dreadful what happened. Were you there when it happened?"

"Yeah. Dreadful," you echo blankly.

Mrs. Parker hovers like she's waiting for you to giver her instructions. "I'll be in the kitchen, miss. Ring for me if you have need anything."

You thank her, and climb the staircase to the second floor. You've wondered what happened to your clothes and books and records after Lizzie moved to Bordesley. Now you know. Michael kept them.

His bedroom, much like the rest of his house, reflects his self. Meticulously tidy and clean. All straight lines and hard, sleek edges, no floral crockery or sentimental clutter. Not on the surface, at least. He never wears his clutter on the surface.

Your clothes are in a large rosewood dresser separate from Michael's neatly ironed three-piece suits (doesn't he own anything else?). You even find your cap among your things. The razor blade stitched into its peak is still sharp.

The lack of sleep finally catching up with you, you fall on the made bed, against the silk-cased pillows and down. Alone again. It's mad to think that, 48 hours ago, you were still a prisoner on death row with no future outside of the hangman's noose.

You roll on your side, blinking sedately. The drawer of the bedside table is left ajar. The only imperfection in an otherwise perfectly orderly picture.

_I shouldn't._

_Michael wouldn't mind._

Snooping used to be part of your profession. Second nature. And it's hard to fight nature.

_Fuck it._

You stick your thieving hand into the drawer and pull out a dog-eared photograph. Your throat tightens. You never got to see the developed picture in the London Times.

The photograph shows you and the rest of the Shelby clan on the steps of the Grace Shelby Institute, hats angled steeply over your eyes. John's standing next to Esme, laughing at something Finn said. Your face used to be fuller. Younger. Belonging to happier times.

Michael has looked at it lot. You run your finger over the edges. They're worn and well-thumbed. You imagine him taking it out at night, kneeling beside his bed like a young boy about to say his prayer. Thinking about you.

It's not the worst thought to fall asleep with.

~~~

"Did you get what I asked for?" You flick your cigarette into the canal and follow Charlie Strong to one of the straw-filled crates he just unloaded.

"Just arrived this morning from the Poplar Docks, and before that, Chicago." He opens the crate and takes out two Thompson Submachine Guns, handing you one to inspect. You weigh it in your hands. It's fucking heavy. Your Webley looks like a toy gun in comparison. "You have to give it to the Americans, bigger really is better sometimes."

Charlie grunts, sticking a soggy cig between his tabacco-stained teeth.

The heat from the nearby furnace brings a film of moisture to your brow. "Right, how much do you want for it?"

"Tommy said it's on the house. A fucking Christmas present, he said."

"Oh, he shouldn't have. I was hoping for a fruit basket, but these will do, I suppose," you snark. Knowing this is as close to an apology as you're going to get from him, you slip the cartridge belt over your head, slinging a Tommy gun over one shoulder each. "Tell him I accept."

"Do I look like a fucking carrier pigeon to you, girl? Bloody tell him yourself," you hear Charlie grumble as he goes back to skewering the Christmas goose under Johnny Dogs' close guidance.

You pick your way through piles of rusty scrap metal and coal. He and Curly set up several tables and mismatched wooden chairs in the middle of the yard for an improvised Christmas dinner.

Curly, Jeremiah and Scudboat are braying the chorus of Molly Malone. Most of the men are sloshed already and it's not even noon.

_"And that was the end of sweet Molly Malone._

_Now her ghost wheels her barrow._

_Through the streets broad and narrow._

_Crying "cockles and mussels, alive, alive, oh_ "

"Oi, it's the Christmas Angel." Leaping up from the table, Isaiah spreads his arms with a big fucking grin on his handsome face.

"And I'm bearing gifts." Your laugh comes out as a wheeze as he wrangle you into a hug. The guns make it a bit awkward, but he doesn't seem to mind.

He tips up your chin with two fingers. "The screws roughened you up a bit, love?"

You forgot about the bruise blooming on your jaw, courtesy of that bitch, Bessie O'Connor.

"Nothing I couldn't handle."

He flicks your chin proudly. "That's a girl."

"Admit it, Siah, you missed me." You hug him tightly around the waist.

Isaiah sighs dramatically. "I don't know, love. You broke my heart standing me up like this. I cried into my pillow every night."

"Oh, come off it, Casanova. Don't think I didn't know you were seeing that barmaid from the Golden Lion." you pout, barely containing your grin. "What was her name? Marge? Mildred?"

"Mabel."

"Riiiight."

"Mickey's been a right git without you here to straighten him out. He didn't even fancy a quick tup—."

You look up sharply. "Siah!"

He throws up his hands and ducks. "I'm joking, cracker. I'm bloody joking. Don't use those guns on me."

Laughing, you shake your fist at him. "Get a girl something to eat, will you."


	15. Chapter 15

Your fingers still over the typewriter. "Review the accounts receivable...?"

"Receivable turnover," Michael finishes without looking up from the close-printed paperwork in front of him. A week after the ambush, he's allowed to leave the bed for an hour a day, but, in true Michael fashion, he's cramming as much work as humanly possible into those sixty minutes. If he got his way, he'd have started working as soon as he could stay conscious for more than five minutes at a time.

"Lizzie told me about this stenography night class she took a few years ago. Down in Greet. Said it changed her fucking life." You look at him speculatively. "I could be a secretary too; what do you think of that?"

He spares the text you just typed out a quick glance. "Not with that spelling."

"Prat." Fighting the childish urge to stick your tongue out at him, you resort to crumpling up the report in your hand and flicking it at the back of his head.

He doesn't look very impressed with you. "You're not the office type, is all. You'd be banging on the walls before lunch."

"I can behave myself."

Paper rustles.

"You can't sit still for five minutes. You never do what you're told. You always argue." He counts your deficiencies on his fingers.

"Liiiiies."

"Mhm," he deadpans.

Picking a telegram from the heap of unopened mail that piled up in the last week, you stand up, and go to lope your arms around his neck from behind. His cheek is smooth against yours. You helped him shave earlier. He complained the entire time, grumbling that he wasn't an invalid. You missed a speck of shaving cream at his brow.

"What are you doing?" He murmurs, not slowing the rapid flick of his pen.

You wave the telegram in front of his nose. "This arrived for you from a Mr. Richard Morrison, Chief Finance Officer of Voce Motors, Mr. Gray," you purr, your lips teasing the shell of his ear.

"Y/N." He says your name sharply. A warning.

"Shall I read it out to you, Sir?" You ask, coy. To your amusement and endless delight, his breath hitches. He sits up straighter.

"It can wait," he says tightly as you nip his earlobe. "Put it on the later pile."

He's trying to keep his composure and failing badly. Biting back a grin, you rub his shoulders. "Poor man, so tense. You work too much, Mr. Gray," you purr, kiss the mole on his neck.

"Are you trying to distract me?" He grits out as you toy with the collar of his robe. His legs widen and his hand grips the head of his walking stick tighter.

"Is it working?"

The cane clatters to the floor. He turns his head, catching your mouth with his, and pulls you onto his lap so you end up straddling him.

"Michael, careful." You break character for a moment to gasp into his mouth. "Polly will have my tits if you rip a stitch."

"You really need to stop talking about my mother right now."

His kiss is demanding and has a frustrated edge to it. A passing of teeth over your cupid's bow, a hand clenching on your hip. You swirl your tongue with his—chasing, retreating, teasing.

Pushing your chest into his, you drag your nails down the short hair at the nape of his neck. You love his hair like that. It's curlier, unpolished, almost unruly.

He kisses you like there's no chance that people might walk in. Like Tommy isn't due for their board meeting any minute now. You roll your hips into his. The friction gives you a full-body shove. You feel his arousal press into the back of your thigh.

"You want to?" He drops the words between your lips, grazing the underside of your breast as he spreads his hands across your ribs.

"I want you," you moan, nudging his nose with yours. Your fingers follow the trail of trimmed, straight hair beneath his navel, and work themselves under the elastic waistband of his pyjamas bottoms.

His breath hisses through his clenched teeth, coiling into your ear, when you grip his cock tightly at the base. His head falls forward between your breasts in surrender. "Fuck. Y/N, I l—"

The clack-clacking of heels sounds from outside the door, dragging your mind out of the gutter and your hand from Michael's pants.

The door handle moves.

You shoot to your feet just as one of the nurses marches into the room. She puts the lunch tray on the overbed table while you fluff your hair in an attempt to look innocent and unruffled. It's not very convincing.

"Mr. Gray, your mother is here to see you."

"Fuck, what now?" Swearing under his breath, Michael shifts in the chair. "Send her in."

"I should go," you say, reaching for your hat and gloves.

"Why?"

"She doesn't like it when I'm here, and I'd rather not have an incident." You let your fingers brush over his knuckles in goodbye. "I'll be back tomorrow with the files you asked for and—Michael?"

Frowning, you look over your shoulder. The woman who entered while you had your back to the door definitely isn't Polly. She's small and full-figured with a round, friendly face.

His lips form the word, but he doesn't say it. _Mum_.

Mrs. Johnson, the woman who took Michael from St. Hilda's to some Cotswolds village, who gave him a new name, a new family and a beautiful bay mare.

She steps forward, clutching a bulging brown paper bag. Her eyes are wet.

"You didn't send a Christmas card. Then I read about what happened in the papers this morning." Her voice wavers, frayed with emotion.

"What are you doing here?" Michael's words are indifferent, callous, but you see the way his fingers curl toward his palms.

"You stopped visiting."

"I sent money."

Mrs. Johnson blinks. "That's not—I have a right to see you, you know. It doesn't matter what name you chose for yourself, I'm still your mum. We love you, Hen—"

She takes a long breath. "I came to bring you these. They're apples from our orchard. All this hospital food lacks proper nutrients." She sets the paper bag on the table and takes out a bright green apple. "Eddie picked them for you."

That almost elicits a smile from Michael. "How is he?"

Mrs. Johnson smiles back, encouraged by the way the set of his mouth has softened. "He's doing a night school course in equine veterinary at Worcester College. He wants to be like his big brother."

Michael stares at his legs. "He doesn't want to be like me, believe me."

Her face falls, a tear running over her wrinkled cheek. "Oh, my boy. My dear boy." She rushes forward to embrace him. He lets her, his hand hovering over her shuddering back.

"And she is your girl?" Mrs. Johnson asks hopefully.

You hold out your hand to her. "Y/N Y/L/N, Ma'am. I'm his—"

"Girlfriend," he finishes for you. "She's my girlfriend." The word zings through you like electricity through a wire.

Instead of shaking it, Mrs. Johnson takes your hand in both of hers. "How pretty you are. All the girls in the village were sweet on my Henry. But he never brought one of them home. Where did you two meet?"

"I, um, work for Mr. Shelby."

A crease appears in Mrs. Johnson's smile. "Oh. Well, you have to bring Y/N over for tea sometimes, so your little brother can meet her...when you're better, of course."

"What about Dad?" Michael's tongue stumbles over the last word like he can't quite remember how to warp his mouth around it.

"Your father, he passed on last summer. He went peacefully. A weak heart."

The blood has drained from Michael's face. He doesn't make a sound even though he's visibly reeling at the news. So used to suffering in silence, to bleeding inwardly. You put your hand on his shoulder. The simple contact anchors him.

"I didn't know he was sick. I wish I'd known."

Mrs. Johnson wipes her eyes. "He didn't want you to worry. He was so proud of you."

Looking down, Michael clears his throat and straightens the paper closest to him. "Go on, I'm expecting Tommy."

"I'll visit again next week. Bring you more apples, maybe some of your old books."

"I don't think that's a good idea," he says, and picks up his pen, clearly dismissing her.

"I see." A sad look crosses her pink face. "Well, I'll be on my way, then. I have a train to catch."

She leans down to press a kiss to the crown of his head, then turns to you. "It was nice meeting you, dear. Very nice."

"You too."

The door clicks shut behind her. Michael's gaze is glued to the report in front of him.

Wordlessly, you pull out a cig and a lighter, and pass the former on to him after the first drag. He needs the smoke more than you do.

"He'd drive me to my accountancy class every Friday after his shift and then wait in the car for two hours. He taught me how to ride a horse—fuck." Michael closes his eyes, his hand reachinv to smooth his hair back.

"Why did you send her away?"

"They're good people. Decent. You know what happens to decent people in Tommy's world. What happened to Grace. I won't let it touch them. I owe them that much."

"They're still your family. You want to protect them."

"Did you ever try to find her? Your mother?" He asks after a long pause.

You shrug nonchalantly before that old, familiar bitterness can creep in. "What's there to find? She left me next to the milk bottles wrapped in a fucking newspaper. She didn't want me."

"Maybe she regretted it."

"Not enough to come back," you say.

"Don't you wonder who she was?" He rolls the pen between his fingers. "I used to wonder all the time."

"You were one of the lucky ones. The rest of us—most of us, really—we just falls through the cracks."

~~~

The Shelby's driver is waiting for you outside. Parked in front of the hospital's uniform red brick buildings, he doesn't glance up from his back copy of the Daily Herald. His nose presses so close to the cheap pulp paper, its tip will probably come away stained with ink.

"Wait!"

You swing toward the caller. "Mrs. Johnson?"

The woman is out of breath, fiddling with her netted grocery bag. "One moment, please. I need to speak with you."

"Are you all right?" You ask awkwardly. You're about as adept at dealing with distressed females as Tommy.

Mrs. Johnson shakes her head. "That man, Thomas Shelby. I saw him go in there just now along with... that woman. These people are poison. My Henry isn't like them. He has to get out. He has to get out before it's too late..."

A car door slams shut.

"I'm not sure I know what you're asking."

"He won't listen to me, but he'll listen to you, I know he will," she urges, and pulls you into her body, her grocery bag between you. Her cheek is dry and smells of rose water.

"Please, help my boy," she pleads frantically. "Please—"

Her entire body jars forward. You try to support her weight as she collapses against you, her head lolling to the side.

You look toward the Bentley. The driver's seat is empty. The man advances on you, teeth bared beneath his short black mustache. You didn't pay attention before, but you recognize him now. He was part of the ambush at John's house. The one that got away. There's a silencer on the gun he aims at you. No one will hear a thing. You're not going to go out with a bang; who would have thought?

All of the sudden, your ears drum with the sound of shots, making the insides of your ears feel fuzzy. Right on cue, four Blinders have jumped out of a parked Vauxhall, all built like brick walls. Their guns cough up smoke as they open fire on the assassin.

Finding himself outnumbered and outgunned, he ducks back into the car, and slams on the gas. The rear window shatters as a volley of bullets whizz through it.

Mrs. Johnson has sagged to the pavement. Her rigid, unblinking eyes reflect the gray sky like glass marbles.

"Nononono—"

Your hands push into her stomach to stop the blood geysering out of her. They slip and slide in the pulpy mess the bullets left. "Help! HELP! Someone get a fucking doctor out here."

"Step back, miss." A nurse touches your shoulder and gently but firmly steers you out of the way.

"No pulse. Bullet wounds. Upper lungs."

"Fatal abdominal trauma."

"Time of death 2:34 PM."

"Are you a relative, miss? Miss?"

You stumble. Dazed, your feet carry you back inside, past the reception desk to Room 9. They're still at it in there, arguing. Sat around the table like enemies negotiating a truce.

"Dropping the Law of the Bullet was part of the modernizations I was working on before...before I was executed."

"You weren't executed, Pol?" Michael interjects.

"What did you call me?"

Tommy is the first to notice you. Slowly, he takes out the unlit cigarette from between his lips. "Y/N?"

The rest of the table swivels their heads. Lizzie comes hurrying toward you, eyes wide with worry. "What happened, darling? Whose blood...?"

Michael struggles to stands, leaning heavily on his cane. His gaze drops to grocery bag tangled between your bloody fingers.

"Oh god, I'm sorry," you sob, head falling against Lizzie's shoulder. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry."

Michael doesn't say anything. He doesn't say a fucking thing.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cw: vomiting

"Come on, fucking hit me!" You growl and swing your fist at Isaiah, sweat burning in your eyes.

"Woah, easy there, firecracker." He dodges your jab, and counters with an obvious right hook. You grunt as his knuckles swipe over your cheekbone.

"Damn it, Y/N, you were meant to dodge that." Isaiah lowers his fists, wipes the sweat from his brow with the back of his arm.

"If you want someone to beat the shite out of you, you should've asked Tommy's new champion, that pasty flyweight. I'm sure he's skulking around the gym somewhere."

"You offered to help me." Your tone is petulant. You dig your hand into the flesh of your cheek, where the skin is heating, to make the sting last longer.

Isaiah climbs out of the fighting ring, throwing a towel over his muscular shoulder.

"I offered to help you unwind, love. Not to help you punish yourself for what happened. Mickey wouldn't want you to blame yourself."

"The fucker was aiming for me. She was just in the way. I'm the reason she...that she.... He isn't even allowed to go to her funeral." Nausea compresses your stomach.

The scene in front of the hospital replays in your mind every time your head hits the pillow. The outcome is always the same, but the dead body tangling around your feet is a different one each night. Some nights it's John, others it's Michael. Esme, Isaiah, Tommy, Lizzie, Michael again.

"Was no one's fault but that Italian son of a bitch's, yeah?"

He passes you a towel. You take it and press it to your damp nape and collar bone. You've stripped down to a sleeveless shirt and a pair of Michael's trousers you asked Mrs. Parker to shorten and take in at the waist.

When you step out of the ring, Isaiah takes you by the shoulder and angles your cheek so he can survey the damage.

"Shite, if that bruises, Mickey's gonna beat my arse with his old man crutch. Ever seen him throw a punch? Like a fucking kangaroo, I tell you."

Snorting, you ball up the towel. "I asked for it."

In the ring next to yours, that Gold boy is circling one of King Maine's prize boxers; a giant of a man. The kid is either very ballsy or very stupid fighting against someone twice his weight. Probably both.

"Aren't you supposed to sit pretty in the shop with the rest of the ladies? Like little birds in a dovecote." Isaiah smirks.

He's right. You promised Lizzie to help her with the inventory. It's a testament of her trust in you that she allows a (not in the slightest reformed) thief anywhere near the Shelby's coffers.

"Well, if that's what we're doing, you should've been invited to join us, Siah."

"Just admit it, love, you're hiding."

"Pffff, I'm not."

"Right. You know, I'm starting to think you're just using me for an excuse."

"And for your cracker body."

"Not you too." He lets out a long suffering sigh. "I thought what we had was different."

"What can I say, I'm a weak woman." You bump his shoulder with yours. "Let's piss off before my desire overwhelms me and I fall prey to your irresistible charm."

~~~

When you enter the betting shop's bathroom, Lizzie hangs over the toilet, miserably gripping the porcelain seat as she chunders her guts out.

"Well, three cheers to that."

Dropping your purse, you rush to her side, and smooth back the hair sticking to her flushed, sweaty face.

"Holy fuck, Liz."

"Urgh, go, you don't have to see this," she groans and retches some more.

"How many times did you do this for me when I tottered back from the Garrison, huh?" You rub circles on her back.

"I'll get vomit on you."

"Shhh, don't worry about it."

Lizzie resurfaces, tearing toilet paper from the dispenser and dabbing at her mouth as the toilet flushes. "Fuck, must be something funny I ate."

You lean against the sink. "Or you're just up the duff."

"Stop it."

"My bet's on Linda's meatloaf. That thing looked pretty vomit-inducing."

Shoving a hand through her wavy, dark hair, Lizzie smiles weakly. "Poor Arthur insisted it was the best meal he's ever had. Looked about ready to do himself in when she kept filling his plate."

"Shoot me if I end up in a marriage like that."

"Thinking about marriage, are we?" Water sputters from the spigot as she washes her hands. Her expression is a blurry stain in the dirty mirror, but you're sure she's smirking.

Heat flares in the high points of your face. "I think you're running a fever."

"You know, darling, you don't need to be alone in that big house. You can live in Number 5 with me and Ada," Lizzie says as you leave the bathroom together. "It would be safer for all of us to be together."

"I'm hardly the first on Luca Changretta's list." You plonk your purse on the mess of betting slips scattered across Esme's old desk

"Michael is."

As if you could forget it. "Point made, thanks, Liz."

Esme's shit hasn't been cleared away yet. Tinny trinkets, brass charms and wooden beads on strings clutter the desk. A framed picture of a combed and fresh-faced John in his starched military uniform.

You start putting them in a box when Finn bounces into the shop in that adorably eager puppy dog way of his, announcing that Tommy put him in charge for today. You and Linda take bets on the phones while your new "boss" spins in Tommy's high-backed chair like it's a fucking merry-go-round.

It's a slow day. That is until Polly emerges from her office and heads straight for you, a cash box under her arm.

"There's a woman outside. She's asking for you." She jerks her head in direction of the window.

"What, me?" You hang up the phone with a frown.

"That's what I said, isn't it? Says her name is Vera Marks. Speaks with a Welsh accent."

_Vera Marks_. You swirl that name around your head, rack your brain, but it doesn't ring any bells.

"Well, what does she want?"

Polly rolls her eyes, and ashes her cigarette on the edge of your desk. "Do I look like a fucking oracle to you? She wouldn't say, but she refuses to leave without having spoken to you, god knows why. So you either talk to her or—" She draws her purse-sized Webley Bulldog. "You make her leave."

You stand up. Polly stops you when you brush past her and holds out the gun, it's handle pointing at your chest.

"Take it. You never know. She could be working for the Changrettas."

It almost feels like a peace offering, albeit a temporary one.

The woman is waiting across the grimy, wind-swept street. There's little remarkable about her. She's rather small. Her clothes are tidy but poorly made, and the hair under her felt hat is starting to gray. Plain is the first thing that comes to mind as you walk up to her, shoulders hunched and shivering without your sable-lined coat.

"Vera Marks?"

The woman looks startled when she sees you, like she wasn't expecting you. "Yes?"

"You wanted to talk to me? So talk."

After a cursory blink, she gives her head a little shake. "Excuse me, I—it's just, you look so much like him."

"Him?"

"Your father."

Down the street, children yell. A dog barks.

Your tongue feels like it's cast in lead. "What did you just fucking say to me?"

Vera winces at your harsh language. "You have his eyes." Her hand reaches for the side of your face, but you shy away from her touch.

"Who are you?"

Her face crumples slightly. "Oh, child. I'm your mum."

"No. No, you're not." The January cold scalds your cheeks as you jerk your head until it's spinning. "I'm an orphan. I don't have anybody."

She smiles. It's a weak, watery thing. "Did you sprout from the earth like a mushroom? You're my daughter. I know you're angry right now, Y/N, but I can explain everything."

You back away, needing space between you and her. "Explain what exactly? Why you gave me away when I was only a few days old? Yeah, right, fuck off."

Vera pales. "I was only sixteen. I was ashamed. Your grandfather, he turned me out when he learned of you. Your father and I were going to get marry at the Scottish border—Gretna Green—but we never made it that far. He left me at an inn near Leeds, nine months pregnant and without a penny to my name. What life could I have provided for you? At least with the nuns you were safe—"

"Just...just stop." You clutch your stomach, unable to bring yourself to look at her for fear of finding a likeness in her homely features. A shadow of familiarity.

"How did you even find me? You didn't stay around long enough to give me a name."

"I made inquiries with the people at the orphanage," Vera says quietly. "Then I read your name in the papers a few weeks ago. The rest was easy enough."

"Why try to find me now?" Suspicion curls in your gut like a coiling snake.

"After I read about that horrible incident, I knew I had to come and see you with my own eyes. You won't believe me but I always wanted what's best for you."

"You're right, I don't," you bite out. "What do you want from me?"

"A chance to know my daughter, that's all I ask. Please."

You stare down at the slushy gray puddle at your feet. You want to send her away, tell her to go to hell and stay there, but there's a part of you that can't quite get the words out.

"Where are you staying while you're in town?"

She looks relieved by your response. "In Aston, at a friend's house. I'll take the train back to Cardiff next Friday. Will you meet with me again?"

"Saturday, 16 South Street, 4 o'clock." You turn on your heels and stomp back into the shop before you can change your mind.

~~~

"Who was that?" Linda cranes her neck when you storm past her. She probably spied on the entire exchange through the window.

"Just some woman delivering a pamphlet." You fish a cigarette tin from your purse. You can tell Polly is listening by the way she pretends to shuffle through the neatly arranged documents on her desk.

"Oh, is that right? You looked rather upset by what she had to say," Linda pries. The woman is fucking relentless.

The lighter clicks as it spits out a flame. "You know how irritating these missionaries can be, Linda."

That shuts her up. She humphs, and you hole up in Michael's old office to do the odds for tomorrow.

It's fucking freezing. He never comes here anymore. Not since Tommy established the Shelby Company's posher aboveboard office further down the street.

Thoughts bang against the insides of your skull like fists against a wall.

_Vera Marks. Mum. Y/N Marks_.

It sounds clunky.

Wrong.

You put your head in your hands. A painful knot of tension is forming behind your brows and it's not because of the numbers. You're about to reach for the phone to call Michael and tell him what happened when the door opens.

"Almost done," you mutter, thinking it's Linda or Polly wanting to close up shop, but it's Finn who sticks his head through the door.

"Um, do you have a moment, Y/N?" He stammers, tugging on his collar as if it's suddenly too tight.

"For you always, _boss._ " You say, and put down the pen. The leather creaks as you lean back in the chair and motion for him to close the door behind him.

You can't say you're not surprised that he's here. Finn is the Shelby you spent the least time with. He's always been shy around you.

"What's on your mind?"

"Well, um." The boy blushes and rubs the back of his head nervously. "You're a girl."

You make an amused sound. "Is that a question?"

"No, I'm sorry." He flicks his eyes toward the ceiling. "I just thought you could give me some, um, advise."

_Well, well._

"Advise, huh? Is this about someone in particular? Someone I know?"

"I don't think... It's not like that," he flounders. "I overheard Lizzie and Linda talking. Lizzie knows a girl from...well, _before_. She'll come to the flat upstairs in an hour. It's supposed to be a surprise. For me."

_How nice of them._

Who knew Linda approved of these things. Small Heath really has a way of making people stray from God.

"And you don't like girls?" You prompt encouragingly, slanting your head while trying to keep a serious face.

"I don't know. I've never...." Finn's face takes on the color of prunes.

"Oh boy." Biting the inside of your cheek, you lace your hands on the desk. "What sort of advice are you looking for?"

"What to do, what to say. So I don't, um, disappoint. **"**

"Why don't you ask one of your brothers? Or Isaiah. You know, from lad to lad."

He gulps. "They'll laugh at me. I'm not like Isaiah. I say the wrong things and suddenly I'm all hands. A bumbling idiot. And you're the only girl I know who isn't—"

"Family."

"Or Linda."

Huffing out a dry laugh, you scrape back the chair. "Right, grab your coat, then."

"Where are we going?"

"To the Garrison. I need something stronger if we're going to have that conversation."


	17. Chapter 17

"There are two ways into Artillery Square. One here on Towpath, and here, Navigation Street." Tommy slaps a finger on a labeled square on the map. Like a general discussing strategy with his officers around a war table, though in this case, the war table is an overturned shipping crate, the kind that the Shelby Company uses to smuggle gin into Prohibition America.

You grind the tip of your boot into the loose dirt as Tommy explains his plan. Yesterday, a Mrs. Ross—the mother of a boy who died in a 'sporting accident', a few years ago—came to him and invited Arthur over for "sandwiches and beer". Subtlety evidently isn't Luca Changretta's strong suit. The whole thing is clearly a set-up.

"Most likely, Changretta's men will come down Navigation Street. Johnny and Isaiah will set up here as hawkers selling salted pork."

Tommy points at another spot on the grid.

"Y/N and Finn, you'll be on the roof of 43 Artillery Square, covering the towpath right here. Arthur will go in alone and unarmed. When you get the signal from me. You can open fire. I'll be in the window overlooking."

He looks from face to face, a single eyebrow raised. "Questions?"

"Have you run out of these beauties, Tom?" Johnny Dogs eyes the Tommy Gun slung over your shoulder slyly.

Charlie wordlessly hands Johnny a much smaller gun.

"Let's go," Tommy says.

He stops you when you're about to climb into the car, gripping the door.

"When the time comes, let Finn do it," he says, careful to keep his voice down. "It'll be good for him."

"Good for Finn or good for you? He isn't John."

Your challenge is met with a cool, impassive look. "Of that I'm aware."

"You just don't care, do you?" You search his face. "Alright, boss. I'll make sure he gets a shot in." You slam the car door shut, nearly severing his fingers.

The vantage point Tommy chose for you and Finn is on the roof of a broken-down, high rise tenant house. The fire escape you climb is a rusted, brittle thing that leaves grimy stains on your hands. You can overlook the canal and the bridge from one side and the street corner where Isaiah and Johnny set up shop with their hawker cart from the other.

Johnny's voice carries far. "Ribs, cheek, and tongue!"

The only thing you can do now is watch and wait for Tommy's signal.

Lowering yourself on your knees to keep out of view, you check your gun's magazine while Finn loads his rifle with clumsy, unsure fingers.

"You alright there?" You glance toward the towpath. No one in sight. "How did it go? Was she nice?"

He fumbles with the bullet, almost drops it. "Yeah."

"Yeah? Did you do the thing I was telling you about?"

Finn stares at the dirt under his fingernails. "I tried but she didn't—she told me to get on with it. To get it over with. I already told Tom, I don't want it to be like that ever again. It felt...empty."

"And what did Tommy have to say?"

"He said I should be a man."

You let out a sigh. "Of course he did."

"He was right. I shouldn't have been so weak."

"There's nothing weak about wanting it to be special—"

Out of the corner of your eye, you detect movement on the towpath. A group of dark-haired men all dressed in black. They seem to be waiting for something.

You lean forward to take aim. Finn copies you.

"Is it them?" He asks through his teeth, sounding very young, all of the sudden.

You put your hand on his rifle and lower it. "I can do it." Fuck Tommy and his orders.

In that moment, the men start laughing.

"Last day of freedom, mate."

"Too late to back out now."

No assassins, just a nerve-racked groom and his best mates on their way to the church.

Unease slithers down the side of your neck like a trickle of perspiration.

Where are you, Changretta?

Something is missing. A hole in the shape of the final piece taunting you from the center of the puzzle.

Your gaze swerves away from the towpath to Navigation Street. Then several things happen in fast succession. A girl dashes from the opening between two houses and runs down the street, waving a white hanky. At her signal, a man gets into a black Rolls Royce and drives away.

The echo of gun shots bounces between the densely clustered houses.

You heft up your gun and reposition, but the rising smoke from the shoot-out in the street makes it impossible to get a clear shot at the retreating car. It turns around a corner and then it's gone.

"Shite." Lowering the gun from your face, you race to the fire escape, taking three steps at a time. You don't look over your shoulder to check if Finn is following.

Not ten seconds later, you run out on the street, sprinting toward Johnny and Isaiah.

"What the fuck was that? Where did they go?" Every breath burns.

"It's a fucking decoy!" Tommy shouts from his lookout—the shattered second floor window of Number 44. "Get Arthur here, now. They're coming for Michael."

"Oh god." The realization sets your head on fire. Arthur was never the target. It's been Michael, all along.

Someone has gripped your shoulders. Isaiah. "It's going to be fine. Johnny's bringing the car around. We'll be at the hospital in twenty minutes."

"He'll be fucking dead by then!" Your heart is pounding so hard and fast, you press a hand to your ribs as if that way you'll be able to stop them from collapsing. Your eyes fall on a dingy bicycle propped haphazardly against a house wall. By the look of it, the owner abandoned it when the shooting started.

In a matter of seconds, you've swung on it, your feet finding purchase on the narrow pedals. Isaiah and Johnny call your name, but the wind blowing around your ears silences them.

The bicycle is faster, more maneuverable than the Bentley. Where the car would get stuck in traffic, you can weft in and out of back alleys and dirt paths that aren't marked on any official maps.

Cold, anxious sweat makes you readjust your grip on the handlebar ever five seconds.

Please, don't let me be too late.

~~~

The white hospital walls are splattered with blood and brains. Changretta left a path of death and carnage in his wake, a crimson trail leading to Michael's room. The floor is slippery beneath your boots, and jt smells like the inside of a butcher's shop, in here.

You step over one of the bodies—Lovelock, you think his name was. He gave you a cigarette on your way out when you left Michael's room last night. The bullet ripped a hole into his pox-scarred cheek. You can see the white of bone beneath.

Your hands shake terribly as you hold up your gun. Fear is festering like an ulcer in the pit of your stomach, spider-walking down your spine. Fear of what horrors might wait for you inside that room.

"Last time my men were sent for you, you got lucky. Now, your luck's run out." A male voice drawls, his distinct Italian-American accent slurring his speech.

"Any last words, Mr. Gray?"

"No!" You burst through the door.

"Y/N, what are you—" Michael instinctively sways toward you, one of his hands pressed over the expanding blood stain on his striped pyjama shirt, but the revolver leveled at his head holds him back.

Changretta considers the weapon you point at him with an unperturbed, yet slightly intrigued expression. He audibly bites down on the toothpick with his molars.

"Ah, giovane amore." Looking back and forth between you and Michael, he tuts. "Who out of the two of you should I shoot first? Or would you like to die together. A more poetic end."

From behind you, the sound of a gun being cocked makes your ears prick. One of Changretta's henchmen.

"Not without sending you to hell with me, motherfucker."

The skin under Changretta's eye twitches. "You have some fight in you. I heard all English women are like..." He waves his hand. "Cold fish."

Michael's hands are crushed into fists. "This vendetta is between our families. Let her go."

Changretta clicks his tongue and digs the gun harder between his eyes, making him wince.

"If you mean it, then get on your fucking knees and beg for her life."

He won't kneel, especially not to a man. And somehow, that bastard knows, knows that he's asking for far more than for Michael to swallow his pride.

You open your mouth to tell him that it's okay, when his strained knees slowly start to bend. It's unsteady and undignified, but then his knees hit the ground and he's bracing himself on the floor with one hand.

"Michael, no—"

He ignores you, breathing heavily. "Go on, get your revenge. Satisfy the demands of your fucking vendetta, but don't hurt her. Please."

"Good boy." Changretta smirks tauntingly, tapping his shiny leather boot. "Frederico, if you will?"

A blunt object—the butt of a gun—impacts with the back of your head. Your vision whites out, and after the initial flash of light, darkness follows.

~~~

"They heard you coming. The gun misfired. They ran away."

"Johnny, Arthur, call Aberama. Tell him to send out his men. And tell him, we inflicted no casualties."

You slip in and out of consciousness. Weightless, mindless, you temporarily exist in the formless ether between two worlds.

"Polly's on her way."

A kaleidoscope of colors flickers behind your eyes as you struggle to peel them open. Groaning, you fumble about groggily. Someone carried you over to the spare hospital bed next to Michael's.

"It's for the swelling. The doctor said you've got a light concussion."

The ice pack slips from your head as you flip your cheek to face Michael, who's sat at the small table. Not working. Just sitting. You want to go to him to make sure he's all right; to nose at his neck and nestle into the secret parts he keeps so meticulously hidden from the rest of the world.

Sitting up, you notice the small object he's rolling between his thumb and forefinger. "What's that in your hand?"

He holds it up for you to see. A single bullet.

"It has my name on it. He left it for me. 'To remember our deal by'."

"Deal?" The word sends a thread of alarm through your foggy brain. "Michael, why am I still alive?" Why are you?

"He didn't come here to kill me," he says quietly.

"What are you talking about? He held a gun to your head!"

"Mum made a deal with him."

"What kind of deal?"

Michael stands up, leaning on his crutch, he cups your face and tilts your face up to his. You turn your cheek to kiss the center of his palm.

"I'm not sure. But you're part of it, now."

~~~

"Sugar? Milk?"

"Two sugar, no milk," Vera says absentmindedly as she looks around the parlour.

Mrs. Parker drops the right amount of cubes in her cup. You watch them dissolve as the woman beside you on the Chesterfield sofa stirs her tea.

"Thank you, Bronwyn. You can leave us."

The housekeeper shuffles away. Silence lapses uncomfortably, dragging on for a few moments after the door has shut softly behind her.

It's Saturday; three days after Changretta came for Michael. Vera arrived at 4 o'clock sharp (not that you checked), wearing the same drab coat and hat she wore when she ambushed you in front of the betting shop.

You sit up straighter. The urge to light a cigarette and ease your anxiety with nicotine is strong, but, against your better judgement, you want to make a good impression on this stranger, who claims to be your mother. Show her that you live properly; that you aren't just another fuck-up.

"So, this is where you live. Fancy." Her gaze drifts over the gold-framed French modernist paintings, Egyptian brown flooring, and expensive art deco furnishing. "I never imagined a child of mine would make a good life for themself."

"This isn't my house." You pick a biscuit from the plate Mrs. Parker prepared. It crumbles between your fingers before it reaches your mouth.

"It belongs to a man?" Vera's mouth pinches as if the tisane left a bitter taste on her tongue. "I was like you once. It's hard to imagine, now that I'm old and dumpy, but I used to be a bit of a provocateur. An easy bit of trim is what your grandfather called me."

"Charming fellow." You reach for another biscuit, even though you're still chewing on the last one.

"Hardly. He was a blithering old fool who was more concerned about what the neighbors thought than his own daughter." She sets down her cup on her lap and meets your gaze directly. "What is it that you do for this Mr. Shelby? I heard he's quite the eccentric character."

"I guess, I just do whatever needs doing."

"An assistant?"

"Yeah, of sorts." You pause, the supple leather creases audibly as you cross your legs. "I have some questions of my own."

"I imagine you do. Go on."

You think for a second. "Where did you grow up?"

"A little coal mining village in South Wales. Your grandfather was the local foreman. It's hard, dirty work, mining. I still find soot in the cracks of my skin. Never seems to go away."

"How did you meet my father? Was he a miner too?"

"No, he—" She frowns, nervously wetting her paper-dry lips. A muscle in her wan cheek spasms. "Would you mind opening the curtains, dear?"

Her odd request doesn't give you pause.

"People always say that when they first come here. It's because of the smoke. We never get to see the sun." You tug the curtains apart, letting in a square of sunlight as pale as cornsilk. "It takes some getting used to, but when you do, the rest of the world seems too bright."

You turn around to see that Vera's hands are trembling. The bottom of her cup clatters against the saucer as she brings it shakily to her mouth.

"Wha—"

The window explodes. A blast of shards assails your back, covering you like a layer of freshly driven snow as you fall on your hands and knees. A Ming Dynasty vase in the trajectory of your head shatters. The sofa's upholstery rips open like a soft underbelly, and the pillows spill padding like entrails.

Pulse thundering between your ears, you crawl behind the nearest armchair for cover as the bullets shred and perforate every square meter of the room.

Then, as suddenly as it began, it stops, the relative silence as jarring as the sounds of destruction. A book and a brass book end fall from the shelf with a thud.

By some fuck miracle, the tea set and the biscuits are still standing as if the last minute didn't happen, at all.

Glass crunches under your knees when you uncurl from the fetal position on the floor and inch around the chair to peek over the armrest.

From your hiding spot, you can see Vera's upper body. She's on her back, clutching at her neck and making low, wet gurgling noises. Blood spurts between her fingers. Her eyes are huge and bulging.

"He...hel..."

She's calling for help, but not from you.

Footsteps approach from the entry hall. Not Mrs. Parker's slow, plodding footfalls. No, these are quieter, almost unhurried.

You listen, hoping that Mrs. Parker was smart enough to stay in the kitchen and not investigate the racket.

The footsteps stop. You can make out the shadow of boots through the narrow slice of space under the door.

Leaping up, you grab a lamp made of Venetian glass from the tea table and flatten yourself against the wall right beside the door.

You grip the lamp's blunt metal stand, holding it like a cricket bat as the door opens.

A man enters. He's wearing a black fedora on his head, and his Winchester rifle is lowered as if he's not expecting any danger. You only see the back of his head as he surveys the room and Vera's squirming form without compassion, but you recognize him immediately. He was the driver. The bastard who killed Michael's mum.

"Where are you hiding, maialino? Come out."

Your hands flex around the lamp.

He spits out his cigarette and laughs, grinding the stub into the carpet with the heel of his boot.

Crack! The impact makes pain shoot up your arms and into your shoulders.

Giving a warbly shout, he staggers forward. You're on him in a second, wresting the rifle from his hands, and sending it skidding across the room with a swift kick.

"Blinder Bitch—" Short nails raked over your face and neck as he tries to buck you off.

"Yes, I am."

The second and third blow pulp his nose and break his front teeth. For John. The fifth knocks him out. For Mrs. Johnson. The sixth dents his head right in. The rest are just extra. At some point, the face changes into another. Older, doughy features, no facial hair, a perversely kind smile.

"FuckyoufuckyouFUCKYOU—"

Panting, you bare your teeth at what was once a man's face. Nausea crawls up your throat as you gaze down at your violent handiwork.

The lamp falls out of your limp hands, and you sag to the side, your anger depleted. Something hot and salty runs down your cheeks. You expect blood, but when you touch your face, the blood is mixed with tears.

Vera stopped putting pressure on the gaping wound in her neck. She's alive, but barely.

"How much?" You ask. "How much did they pay you?"

Vera coughs. "Twenty pounds," she rattles.

"You'd betray your own blood for twenty bloody pounds?"

"You're as much mine as that pile of minced meat over there," she chokes out nastily, her gaze flicking to the dead Sicilian. "I don't know who your mother is, girl, but it ain't me. Never had a brat of my own. And looking at you, I'm jolly glad of it."

"But why go to the trouble of finding me if you're not."

"Some big time swell hired me to play dear old mum to you." She coughs again, her eyes losing focus.

But why?

"Who hired you? Luca Changretta?"

Blood bubbles between her teeth as she wheezes. Her voice has a reedy, whistling quality to it. "Not the Italian. Another one. Younger. Never...never met with him."

"You must have been given a name. Tell me."

You never get a response.

~~~

You enter the Shelby's kitchen through the betting shop. The mood is light and careless like there's cause for celebration.

"So, you got three?" Johnny crows.

"Yeah, I got three."

"Well, I drink to you, Tom, you mad bastard."

"That leaves us with what, eight of those fuckers?"

"Make that seven." You drop the unloaded Winchester rifle on the table like it's spoils of war. Technically, it is. When you look up, you're met with wide-eyed stares. Right, the blood. You must look like you were in the immediate vicinity of someone entering a threshing machine.

"Fuckin' hell, poppet." Johnny drawls around the pipe between his teeth.

"Aye, today was a win for the Peaky Blinders, I reckon." Arthur gives you a manly clap on the back. You can't decide if it's pitying or congratulatory.

You lock eyes with Tommy across the room. "I need to get rid of the bodies," you tell him.

"Bodies?" Polly questions sharply.

Tommy must have seen something in your face because he hands her little Charlie.

"Johnny, Charlie, go to Michael's house and take care of it. The rest of you, get the fuck out."

"What about getting a drink, brother?"

Tommy rounds the table as the others get up and leave the kitchen. Lizzie squeezes your wrist in passing.

"You go ahead without me. I'll be right there."

"To yer health, Tom. Y/N."

You're lucky to find a chair under you when the door shuts and your legs give out.

"Drink?" Tommy asks.

"What do you have?"

"Port wine, bourbon, vodka,..."

"Which one does the most damage?"

"Bourbon hurts more the next day."

"I'll take it, then."

He puts the whole bottle in front of you.

"First time?"

"You know it's not."

"First time with your bare hands, I mean." His brows pinch as you fill both your glasses well past the half. "Feels different, eh? Makes it more real. Not as easy to pretend it wasn't you flicking that switch when you feel their warm flesh give under your own two hands."

The bourbon pools in the back of your mouth, scalding your tongue. "I liked you better when you were a man of few words, Tommy."

"Let's drink to those poor devils, then."

He clinks your glass with his.

"I got one of them at point-blank range," he says grimly, staring at the ugly wallpaper. "Made his head burst like an overripe fruit."

It's odd to see Tommy so melancholic.

"If it makes you feel better, I have no doubts we're going to join them soon enough. If not by a bullet then this stuff will do the trick."

"Pulvis et umbra sumus."

"We are but dust and shadow," you finish for him. "Don't look at me like that. I do read."

For a few minutes, you're both sipping your drinks in companionable miserable silence.

"I assume you knew about the deal Polly made. My life in exchange for her son's."

"Yes." The bourbon didn't taste as bitter a second ago.

"Michael told you."

"If you're expecting an apology, you won't hear one. You know why I did it."

Tommy nods, finishes his glass. "I want you to go with him."

"Go where?"

"The Boswells and Palmers are kin. They agreed to take you with them when they travel north."

The thought of Michael trudging irritably around the woods in his bespoke suit and shined shoes makes you snort. "He'll hate it. We'd have to kidnap him."

"He'll go if he wants to live. After today, there'll be no more deals." Unexpectedly, he grabs your shoulder to turn you to him. "You hear that, YN? No more deals, eh. No funny business behind my back."

You shrug off his hand. "I hear you, boss."


	18. Chapter 18

Michael smacks his head on the wagon's roof as the vardo jolts and trundles like a drunk toddling off into a ditch outside the Garrison.

"I hate this."

You pet his arm. "I know, baby."

"I can't believe you and mum conspired to kidnap me."

"An unlikely alliance. Believe me, no one is more surprised than I am."

He scowls down at the silver head of his walking stick as the wagon sways precariously. "You threatened to escort me into the woods at gunpoint."

To be fair, when you told him about Tommy's plans, he'd acted like wild animals couldn't have dragged him into the car.

"Think of this as a holiday. God knows we all need one."

He gives you a dark look. "We're off to live in the woods and eat bloody hedgehogs, not on some pleasure cruise in the Mediterranean."

"I'm sure Mr. Gold was teasing you about the hedgehogs. But I'll shoot you a rabbit. A big, fat one." You lean over to press a kiss to his lips, but he turns his cheek, still sulking.

"Oh, don't be such a curmudgeon, Michael. This is going to be fun."

He doesn't look convinced.

The vardo bumps over a root on the forest floor and rolls to an unsteady stop. A moment later, the door swings open and Bonnie Gold hangs in the frame in that swaying, loose-limbed way of his. "We're here."

"And where the fuck is that?" Michael glares at him.

Bonnie shrugs and easily shoulders the carpet bag containing a several changes of clothes and Michael's medicine and painkillers. "Somewhere between No Man's Heath and Runcorn. Shake a leg, you don't want to make the Widow wait. You're expected."

"Widow?" You ask as you hop down the wagon's steps after him.

"Madame Boswell. The woman who was generous enough to take you in. She's in charge around here."

Michael follows a little stiffly and looks around the busy clearing with a sneer.

Shaded under the cool forest canopy, the camp is made up of five wagons, each of them elaborately painted and decorated with beautiful tinwork. An old woman sits in front of one of the wagons and milks a skinny goat. Men pause in their respective tasks—collecting kindling, skinning a rabbit, fetching water for the horses—to watch you suspiciously. You don't see any children.

"Don't look so jealous, Mr. Gray, or they'll think you're going to steal from them," Bonnie warns with narrowed eyes. You can feel the tension mounting between the two of them like a physical thing.

A smoky voice interrupts their little pissing contest. "So, you're Birdie's grandson?"

The Boswell matriarch looks like a Romany queen. She's gathered a dozen shawls around her slight shoulders, holding them in place with brass brooches and jewel-tipped pins and her own gout-ridden hands, rings on every one of her bony fingers. She looks like Polly twenty years from now.

"Let me have a look at you, boy. When I last saw you, you were still hanging at your mother's teat." Madame Boswell studies her great-nephew with heavily kohled eyes as dark as apple seeds.

After a moment, she humphs in disapproval. "You don't have the Boswell eyes. You come after your father."

"You knew him?" Michael asks, forgetting to feign indifference, for once.

"Aye, I knew Joseph since he was a wee lad stealing fillies at the fair. I didn't care much for him. Never heard a true word out of that man's mouth. Let's hope you have more of Pollyanna in you."

Feeling him tense beside you, you slip your hand in his. "Thank you for offering us sanctuary. We won't be in the way."

The old woman's piercing gaze, not at all clouded by age, peels back the layers of your skin and bone. The effect is unsettling, like she can look right into head through your eyes.

"That remains to be seen, child."

~~~

"No. No fucking way."

"What did you expect? A gold bathtub and running water?"

"It's barbaric."

You step out of your boots and put them in a dry spot under one of the trees that spring up along the river. "Christ, when did you become such a snob? Remember how the nuns would make us stand under that horrible pump on washing day?"

"You girls always used up all the warm water—what are you doing?" His voice catches as he watches you wriggle out of your trousers' cuffed legs.

"What does it look like? I'm taking a dip," you say in your sweetest, most reasonable voice, and brazenly pull the knit sweater over your head, leaving you in nothing but your knickers. The chill of the air makes your skin pebbles and your freezing toes curl in the shingle.

Michael looks over his shoulder toward the camp. The sound of distant laughter scrapes past your ears, filtering through the trees. Vandlo Palmer and his men just returned from a hunt when you left.

"Why, Mr. Gray, are you concerned for my modesty?" You ask playfully and lower your arms from your chest, preening like a cat when his eyes drop briefly to your tits. "Bit too late for that, don't ya think?"

A squeal gets stuck in your throat as the river laps at your ankles. The cold water makes your skin tighten until it feels too taut for your bones. You paddle like a dog as you, splashing water left and right. There was a municipal swimming pool in Wolverhampton. You would pass it when an ailing Mrs. Teach sent you to pick up her 'cold & grippe' tablets from the apothecary. She'd pinch your arm and pull your hair when you came home an hour late, damp fingerprints on the paper bag with the radium tablets, and smelling of pool chlorine.

You swim until your submerged to your fourth rib, then turn to look over your shoulder.

Michael is still standing on the bank, fully clothed, his palms turned out.

"Come here! It's not even that cold."

"Your lips are turning blue."

"Which is entirely your fault. I wouldn't be cold if you were here to warm me up." You pout, but the effect is ruined by your chattering teeth.

"Y/N."

"Come on, or I'm going to ask one of the Palmer boys to do the job for you. That Cam fellow has very muscular calves."

Looking up at the sky, Michael swears under his breath and suggests that Cam does something anatomically impossible with his calves, but he starts shrugging out of his suit jacket. You saw the contents of his case earlier. He packed as if he's going on a business trip—all tan suits and crisp ties and white pressed shirts. Who he's trying to impress out here, you don't fucking know.

He strips down to his boxer shorts, his injuries lagging his movements. He's lost weight since the ambush. The skin around his scars is paler than the rest of his body, pink around the edges. Small waves ripple across the surface and break on your body as he wades through the current.

"God, I know that look. Am I in trouble?" You lick your lips.

"Very."

Anticipation flows in your stomach, swirling and cresting like the water surrounding you. Suddenly, you become acutely aware of the fact that you're alone. In the hospital, there were were always nurses bustling about, making their rounds. Tommy's men right outside the door listening.

Michael catches your foot and pulls, a slow, lazy smile on his lips. "Say you're sorry."

"No."

"Last chance."

"Never."

Kicking your legs, you make a show of trying to escape, putting up a fight, but he's having none of it and ropes both arms around your hips to reel you in.

"You sure about that?"

"Fine, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Honest. Your calves are superior. Mercy, please." Your breathing is heavy and exhilarated, chest brushing against his. You've long stopped shivering.

"Not sure that's good enough. I think you need to be punished."

You cling to him like a little monkey, thighs bracketing his waist. "Nononono, don't you dare—"

Your protests dissolve into incoherent sputtering and bubbles as he dunks you. Water shoots up your nose. When you surface again, you glare at his smug, stupidly handsome face, water dripping down your chin. "You brute!"

He looks younger with wet hair. It makes his ears stick out boyishly.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" You ask, feeling a ribbon of self consciousness in your chest as his breath strokes your face.

"You have an eyelash...here." His thumb brushes your cheek and he shows you the culprit on the pad of his finger. "You have to wish on it."

"Really? Michael Gray subscribing to superstitious claptrap? Polly is rubbing off on you." Taking his finger between two of yours, you dip your head, but instead of blowing on the loose lash, you plant an open mouthed kiss on his throat. It bobs under your lips.

Michael groans. Gripping you under your arms, he hitches you up his body so his hard mouth can cover yours. You melt against him, dragging at his shoulders to bring him closer and kiss across his cheek. His tongue meets yours stroke for stroke with practiced ease as he snogs you thoroughly. Your legs wrap around his middle, heels digging into the tight muscles above his arse. The friction of your underwear against his flat stomach makes you grind yourself on him while his hands travel north. As if reading your thoughts, he carries you out of the water by the arse. You break the kiss with a hiss when he lays you down.

This is it, you think. You imagined the first time you went all the way would would be in a bed in some gauche hotel suite. Paris, maybe. Silk sheets, a bottle of chilled Dom Pérignon and a view of the Place Vendôme. Not on the forest floor with prickly pine needles and pebbles poking your back. Now that you're here though, you wouldn't have it any other way.

He holds himself so rigidly above you, you can't help but stifle an impish giggle.

“What's so funny?” He frowns down at you, sounding mildly offended. You reckon it's not often that he gets that kind of reaction from a woman who's under him.

You press an apologetic kiss to his pectoral. “You should see yourself. So focused. So serious. Like you're on a mission."

"I am."

"Oh?"

His grin is positively filthy. "I'm going to fuck you until you can't move."

A laugh shakes loose, bubbling out of your chest. "Such a romantic. Proceed. Do your worst."

You lift your hips, helping him peel you out of your sopping wet knickers, kicking them down your ankles.

His teeth scrape your jaw as he positions himself at the junction of your shuddering thighs and pushes forward. Far from innocent, you still have to hold his waist and suck in a breath. The base of your spine tingles. You can feel him behind your naval. So deep you're not sure where you end and he begins, so deep you might never get him out. You thought it would scare you, how thoroughly, how completely, in love with him you are, but it doesn't. He carved out a place for himself in your chest, above your heart, when you were just a pair of hopeless kids crouching around a wishing well, skinned knees in the mud.

You know he feels it too. He kisses those three words into your skin, jotting them under your jaw, on your lips, the underside of your breast, and the dip of your chin.

"God Michael."

Your kisses deepen, turning slow and methodical as he thrusts shallowly, building speed until pleasure fizzles in your toes.

"So fucking lovely." He drips the sweetness of his words into your mouth like Tommy's too sweet gin. Your hands lace on both sides of your head. When you can feel his rhythm falter and his breath twinge with exertion, you push him on his back.

"It's the wound—"

"I know." You steal another kiss, careful to keep your weight off his injury as you imitate the rhythm he dictated before with your hips. Michael doesn't break eye contact, his mouth hanging open slightly, his cheeks flushed, as he sneaks a hand between your bodies. The muscles in your thighs start to quiver. It's your only warning before you unravel like a wound string. His hands go to your hips, clenching, massaging until the tremors subside.

Minutes or hours later, you're lying on Michael's chest, humming happily. You feel boneless, light enough to float away on the breeze that rustles through the leaves tree above you.

"This doesn't feel real. Feels more like a dream."

"You have dreams like these often?" He asks with peaked interest, those sinful fingers tickling your side.

"When I'm lucky." Smiling, you brush a damp lock of brown hair from his forehead. "In prison, I had a cell neighbor, Mary. She always talked about wanting to go to America to become an actress. Said her fiance was waiting there for her. He wasn't. She swung for butchering the poor sob with a corn knife on their wedding day."

You swallow. He strokes a hand over your shoulder blade, a silent prompt to go on.

"She had these pictures, postcards, right, dozens of them. Hollywood Boulevard, the Chinese Theater, sandy coves, palmettos, beaches that go on for miles."

You draw stars over the scar tissue that has formed over his gunshot wounds. "The screws threw them away when they took her stuff, but at night, I could still see all those bright lights. All that blue water."

He's quiet, contemplative.

"Hollywood, Michael, think about it. There's no smoke there, no more business. No Tommy. We can be free of Brimingham. Shake all that coal dust out of our clothes."

"I promised Polly I'd go to Australia with her. For Anna."

"Then we'll go there, and after that—" The look on his face kills the words before they're out. The warm, dizzying feeling in your stomach dissipates like rain on hot pavement. "You have no intention of leaving, do you? Not for Australia. Not anywhere. Not even for your mum, or me."

"Leaving this life behind...Birmingham, the business...it's just a dream, Y/N. Polly knows that. We chose it. And we continue to choose it every single day."

You realize then that living in Small Heath is like being trapped in the bowels of a hungry beast. It keeps feeding and digesting. Dreams, ambitions, people. It doesn't care about innocence or decency, and it will never ever be full. And Tommy...Tommy Shelby isn't a victim of that city. He is the beast, and he won't stop devouring until the whole world is lining his stomach.

~~~

The inside of the healer's vardo is hazy with the fumes of sweet herbs and oils. The healer is about Ada's age, but her face is grittier, the skin as though as tanned leather. The bangles on her wrist jingle like little bells as she works at the table with mortar and pestle, a green scarf swathed over head.

"I know why you're here," she says. "You're not the first. They all come to me at some point. Village girls, married woman who can't afford another hungry moppet to feed."

You squirm, a flustered sort of heat pooling in your cheeks against your will. "Well, then you know what I'm asking."

"When was the last time?"

"Um, yesterday. I took a bath afterward."

"Soaking your parts in some warm water won't do anything," she says, not unkindly. "Did he withdraw?"

You nod. It's too damn hot in here. "Someone I knew said to use mugwort." Esme didn't plan on having any more children after little Jordie.

"It's too late for that." The healer opens a tin jar on the table behind her and takes out a small sponge and a very small, corked glass bottle. "This soaked in tansy oil will take care of it."

You slink out of the vardo like a thief in the night, the incriminating oil and sponge shoved deep into your trousers' back pocket.

It's midday. The camp is moving around you, disappearing into chests and crates and being loaded into the wagons, only to be reassembled again later wherever the crows and the wind takes them.

You spot Michael with one of the horses—a stout black cob strong enough to pull the wagons. His sleeves are rolled up to his elbows. He scratches a spot between the horse's ears, talking to it in a low voice. The set of his mouth is soft, relaxed, and the skin around his eyes crinkles slightly.

"Should I be jealous?" The hem of your trousers are wet from dragging through the dewy meadow.

There's a rare, mischievous glint in his eyes. "I didn't know you were so keen on sugar cubes."

"My biggest vice." You hook two fingers around his suspenders. He surprises you by putting his arm around you. Michael js never this affectionate when others might be around to see.

"Why is she it apart from the others?"

"She's in foal." He pats the mare's long neck. The fine hairs on his arm appear blond in the sun.

"Poor thing," you mumble and let the horse nose and nibble at your sleeve, probably on the hunt for more sugary treats. No mugwort for you either, old girl.

"You want to ride her?"

You jerk your hand back, shaking your head. "Oh no, I couldn't." You've never been on a horse before, and if you're honest, the mere thought scares the shite out of you.

"Don't be afraid. She's gentle."

"Is that safe? In her," you wave at her distended middle, "condition?"

"It's fine," he says confidently. "She isn't due until a few months."

"I don't know how to ride, you know that."

He takes your hand. "I'll teach you


	19. Chapter 19

On the seventh night, there's singing and dancing. Bottles are being passed around the fire, its embers flying like dust motes. One of the Palmers, a man with a patched Derby hat and a handlebar mustache, is strumming a fiddle and singing in a baritone that's deeper than a bullfrog's.

_"There lived a lady in the West,_

_I neer could find her marrow;_

_She was courted by nine gentlemen_

_And a ploughboy-lad in Yarrow_."

Your fingers are stiff with the cold, despite the proximity of the flames. Nehemiah Palmer's lingonberry schnapps has left a warm buzzing in your bones, and as the night progresses, you find yourself joining easily into the merriment, spinning around the fire until you're laughing with your entire face. Through the haze of heat and pipe smoke, you can feel Michael watching you under a deep-set frown. He looks like he's being forced to bear witness to a pagan ritual, but you're far too drunk to ponder what darkened his mood tonight.

When the song ends, you collapse to the ground in a giddy heap and accept the bottle from Cam—one of Michael's distant cousins—with a breathless "thanks" and a dizzy smile.

"It's your turn now." Cam nudges you with his broad shoulder. He's a few years older than you. Handsome in a rugged, unconventional way.

"Turn to do what?" Confusion muddles with the alcohol fog in your mind.

"To sing."

Your eyes widen. "Yeah, right. Absolutely not."

"Poppycock," Nehemiah Palmer booms on your left, patting his barrel-shaped middle over his straining yellow waistcoat. His dotted neckerchief almost disappears under folds of pink flesh. "It's tradition that guests share a song when they're given a place at our fire."

"I don't know any songs."

"Everyone knows a song," Cam insists.

"Let's hear it."

_Fuck me_.

"Right, up with you." Cam pulls you to your feet. You fidget awkwardly under their expectant, fire-bright gazes when a long-faded memory trickles into your mind. Girls in bleak gray frocks, singing a skipping song while the rope swings and swings and swings.

_"Oranges and lemons,_

_Say the bells of St. Clement's._

_You owe me five farthings,_

_Say the bells of St. Martin's."_

Your voice scratches in your throat as you start, hands behind your back like you're singing at a Sunday mass. The nuns would flick the back of your neck with a ruler if they caught you slouching.

_"When will you pay me?_

_Say the bells at Old Bailey._

_When I grow rich,_

_Say the bells at Shoreditch—"_

From the corner of your eye, you see that Michael is no longer sat by the fire. You can make out a dark silhouette limping toward the vardo you've shared these past few nights.

You mutter a quick apology to the group before you go after him. The schnapps makes it hard to go in a straight line. You have to concentrate, carefully set one foot in front of the other. Moths attack the lantern hanging from wagon's curving eaves.

He's in the process of undressing when you let yourself in.

"My singing is that awful, huh?"

Your attempt at humor bounces right off him. Michael continues to passive-aggressively unbutton his shirt, jaw tight, his back facing you. His fingers are slowed and unsteady. He shouldn't drink while he's on medication.

"Michael." You lift your chin, fed up with his antics. "Bloody hell, what's gotten into you?"

"Why don't you ask Cam?" His voice is cold enough to leave frost bites. He jerks his arms out of his shirt sleeves and tosses it on the built-in bunk in the rear of the wagon with none of his usual care. "I'm sure that wanker would fancy another fucking dance."

You make a sound; half disbelief, half amusement. "My god, are you jealous?"

"Where were you this afternoon?"

Bracing your palms on your hips, you blow out an impatient breath. "Oh, this is to be an interrogation, then?"

"Yes."

"You really are becoming too much like Tommy."

"You were in the woods with him."

"Yes, setting up snares with his father and brothers so His Highness doesn't have to chew tree bark for dinner. What do you think happened?"

"Doesn't matter," he says aloofly.

"No, don't do that. Don't fob me off like that. You're drunk and you're picking a fight for no reason."

Michael's laugh is bitter, a double-edged blade. "Maybe, people are wrong about me. I'm not like Tommy. Maybe, I'm more like my old man. A mean fucking drunk."

"I didn't say that. This isn't about Cam, at all, is it?" You ask sharply.

Michael finally turns to you, thrusting an agitated hand through his tousled hair. "How do we know we can trust these people? What's stopping them from selling us out to the Italians?"

Your brows knot, a frisson of alarm skating down your back. "Their word. They're honorable people."

"They're strangers. We don't know them. You can't get attached."

You scoff, moving toward the small cast-iron cooking stove. "Is that what you think I'm doing? Getting attached? It's been a week, Michael. If they wanted to sell us out they would've already done so by now. Besides, the Boswells are your kin. They won't betray one of their own. It's not their way."

"You still believe that after what happened with the Marks woman? Blood can betray blood. Anyone can fuck over anyone."

The word hits you like hail. Your blood flash-freezes, banishing the warmth the alcohol left in your veins. "What did you just say?"

"Anyone can—"

"No." You drop your arms, shaking your head. The vardo sways. "That name...how do you....I never told you her last name."

"Some big time swell hired me to play dear old mum to you."

"Who hired you?"

"Not the Italian. Another one. Younger. Never...never met with him."

The oil lamp casts one half of his face in light, the other half in shadow. Unreadable to anyone but you.

"Y/N..."

Something in your chest collapses. Your upper body jars, doubling over as if you were struck by a bullet. "It was you."

"I can explain—" He reaches for you, but you stumble back, holding your hands up between you like a threat. Like a weapon.

"Don't," you hiss. "Get away from me."

"Fuck, if you'd just listen to me."

"Why? So you can tell me that there's a reasonable explanation for why you hired some random woman off the streets so she can pretend to be my mother?" Your voice catches, edging toward hysteria.

His mouth opens and closes, then opens again. "That's not—it's not what it looks like."

"Were you fucking embarrassed for me? Tommy's Golden Boy can't be with some nobody from the gutter." You emphasize every sentence with a shove. "Pathetic Y/N with her fuck up past. Not even her own mother wanted her. So you paid her. That's how you fucking Shelbys deal with things, aight? Just throw some money at it."

"I did it for you, okay?" Michael catches your wrists before you can push him into the glass-fronted China cabinet, pinning them at your sides. "And I didn't fucking pay her."

"I heard her say it. That woman was minutes from death. She had no reason to lie, unlike you."

"I hired a private investigator to look into your case," he rushes out, tightening his grip on you as if he can feel you retreating into yourself, slipping through his fingers like water. "There wasn't much to go on, but he tracked down Vera Marks. I contacted her and sent her a few pounds for a train ticket."

"You—you had no right to go digging in my past. I told you to leave it; that I didn't want to know." You grab your head. The back of your throat aches with the onset of tears. "Fuck, I killed a man because of this. I can never wash my hands clean of that shite, do you understand?"

Michael slopes his chin down, scrubbing his cheekbone with his knuckles. "I didn't know Changretta would approach her with a deal." His jaw clenches and his eyes close briefly. "After what you went through in prison, I thought you might need her."

"Well, I don't." Your throat bobs with a swallow. "You know what your problem is? You think cause you're smarter than most people in the room, you know best."

You flatten your hand over the center of his chest. His heartbeat is slamming against your palm.

"You weren't supposed to hurt me. Never you." You give his chest a shove and push past him and out into the night.

He doesn't come after you. You tell yourself it's for the best, even if part of you wants him to.

~~~

You approach the lone figure sitting by the fire barrel. The party has dispersed for the most part. In the dark, it's hard to navigate the empty bottles that are scattered on the churned earth of the forest floor.

The firelight catches the rings on Madame Boswell's finger as she shuffles a deck of cards. "Have you come to have your fortune told, girl?" She draws her gaze from the flames to you, but you can still see the fire dancing within them.

"No."

"Come, sit."

Hunkering down, you pick up one of the surviving bottles and take a large swig, tucking your chin to your chest as you swallow. You just want to forget tonight.

An owl is hooting in the distance, swooping through the tangled branches on the hunt for some small, skittish woodland creature.

The old woman keeps shuffling the cards in her liver-spot-mottled hands. The beaded shawl around her shoulders shifts and reveals a sapphire the size of a bird's egg. The pendant rests against her breastbone on a thin silver chain. You don't need someone from the Jewellry Quarter to ascertain its authenticity.

"You've got the look of a magpie about you." Madame Boswell fingers the glittering stone. "You know something of jewels?"

You lick your lips, feeling a near irresistible urge to reach out and feel the sapphire's cool, glass-smooth weight. It would be heavy in your palm. 45-carats, at least. "A thing or two."

"You're wondering how someone like me gained possession of such a precious item, no? It came to me through a tragedy. It's impure, cursed, but of course, you gorgers don't believe in curses."

"I don't," you confirm. "You never tried to sell it? It must be worth at least—"

"—50 000 pounds. I had the worth estimated. They say it used to decorate a French king's crown, before they melted the crown and lopped off the king's head."

"You could be a rich woman. And yet you choose to sit on all that money."

"Gorger money means nothing to me. This stone has seen too much blood. Too much death. I wouldn't sell it too my worst enemy. For now, I'm its keeper." Letting the pendant drop back under her scarves, she reaches for her stack of hand-painted tarot deck. "Pick a card," she commands.

You don't dare to argue. When you've drawn a card, she crooks her fingers, motioning for you to show it to her.

"The lovers. The most fickle card of them all," she hums as she inspects the naked intertwined bodies painted there with elegant brush strokes. "You're standing at a crossroads, on the very precipe of change. There are two paths available to you. But once you've chosen, the other path becomes lost to you, forever."

"What does that mean?"

"Draw another one."

Reluctant, you randomly point at the back of a second card.

She turns the card over in her hands, her voice as thick as incense. "The Trickster. Unusual. This one may represent abrupt change; or a lack of direction. Chaos. A black cat. You're going to betray and be betrayed."

The Trickster is grinning madly, his unnaturally wide mouth a slash of red in a white moon of a face. Cowbells jingle on his jester suit "Who is it? Who's going to betray me?"

A dozen faces flash before your eyes—Tommy, Polly, Linda, Michael.

"The cards don't tell a full story, only fragments of a whole."

"How bloody convenient for you," you mutter, rolling your shoulders to ease the tensely coiled ache in them.

"Another one."

Your hand hovers over the cards for a moment like there's an invisible string tied around your wrist. Worrying your lips, you tap the edge of a card. She flips it, and your stomach dips.

Death is represented as a gravedigger, holding a shovel. All bones, and pale as a maggot.

"Death is no stranger to you. It's scent clings." She tilts her head, the intensity of her gaze both enthralling and unsettling. "Has someone close to you died recently? A family member?"

You shrug. "You know who I'm working for. The days when no one dies are more memorable."

"There's someone..." Madame Boswell's gaze turns glassy. The temperature seems to drop around you. "She's been waiting for a long time. Poor thing died young. Too young."

You flinch as her hand grabs yours, her skin feeling as dry and brittle as dead leaves.

"What does she want?" Your pulse is pounding in your temples, unnerved by the sudden shift in her behavior.

Her fingers tighten like a vice, pupils dilating until they eclipse the dark rings of her irises. "She wants to speak to you. She heard your song—her song. She didn't think you'd remember. The other's all have forgotten."

Your shoulders stiffen to the point of pain. It couldn't be.

"She says her name is Jane."

Jolting back, you withdraw your hand and cradle it to your chest, disturbed. There's no way she's taking about the same Jane, you think. After all, it's the most common name in England.

Madame Boswell blinks hard and moves her head like she's shaking off the remnants of a dream. Pulling her scarves tighter around herself, she gathers her cards with jittery hands, scattering them in the process. Somehow, she looks older than before, like she's aged a decade in the span of an hour.

"Off with you, now. The fire is dying."

She's right. The barrel's gone cold. You get to your feet.

"Don't tell Polyanna's boy what was in your cards. It isn't wise to speak of the dead when they can hear."

~~~

Michael's breathing is deep and even when you leave the bed and get dressed. A soupy gray dawn hangs outside the door, as murky as stale, day-old tea, tangling in the tree branches above like a flown off widow's veil. The rest of the camp hasn't stirred awake yet. Even the horses are still asleep with their eyes are open. Madame Boswell slept like that too when you sneaked into her wagon, an hour ago. It's more common than people think.

The soft, damp grass cushions your footsteps. You're transported back to your thieving days, the brilliantly executed burglaries that had every lady from Belgravia to Mayfair move their jewelry box from their vanity to a Hatton Garden safe deposit. Not that that ever stopped you.

"Where are you going?"

A slump-shouldered has shadow emerged from the mist. It's Nehemiah, a hunting rifle propped against his shoulder.

You stop in your tracks, your hand going to the weight in your pocket. You were wrong before. It's definitely more than 45 carats.

"Back to Birmingham."

"What should I tell Michael?"

You feel the weight of the priceless sapphire in your pocket with every step as you prowl past him. "Tell him he was right. It was a dream."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/n: in case you're lost, Jane was mentioned waaaay back in Part 9 when they're in the kitchen at Arrow House and Reader learns that Charlotte is pregnant with Michael's baby. She was the girl who died during Reader's time in the orphanage bc of an unsafe abortion and she's going to play a key role in bringing down a certain someone in S5 ;)
> 
> 3 chapters left and then that's a wrap for S4! Thank you sm for sticking with this story so far. It means the world💖


	20. Chapter 20

Birmingham is out for blood, tonight.

It looks like the entire city has come to watch Bonnie Gold get beaten to liver paste by the Giant Goliath. With all the tensions running high in the factories and on the streets, some of the men here tonight came just to see Tommy Shelby lose something for once.

You're not sure which draws more eyes: your dress—a daringly short golden number with a dramatic low-cut back—or the sapphire, the size of a child's fist, at your throat.

"No weapons! No admission if you've any weapons."

Pushing through a wall of yeasty beer-and-meat-breath and testosterone, you cut in front of a group of rowdy factory workers to get to the front of the line. Johnny Dogs and some of his kin are conducting security searches, confiscating everything from switchblades to crowbars and coppered knuckle-dusters.

"You're good, go on—well saddle my back and call me a horse! Would you look at that." Johnny's face splits into a cheshire cat grin as he shoves the bloke he just searched toward the theater's brightly lit entrance and turns to you with wide-flung arms.

"Aren't you supposed to be traveling with the Boswells? Couldn't stay away for long, could you?"

You shrug, the velvet straps of your dress slipping over your shoulder. "Didn't fancy the food. And I missed your cooking."

"The missus would be very jealous to hear that."

"You don't have a wife, Johnny." You snort-laugh. "You're not gonna search me, are ya?"

"That fucking rock you got there is big enough to count as a weapon." Johnny's glib gaze snags on the sapphire pendant, his tongue polishing his teeth. You know that shifty look in his eyes only too well. "Last time I've seen one that big..."

"What?" You ask, brows pinching. "What is it?"

For a moment, his face takes on a more serious expression, but then his frown slips and he laughs, sweeping a mock bow. The man's as slippery as an eel. "Right, go on in, princess. The fight's already started."

You can tell. The bloodthirsty, goading roars of the crowd are buzzing like a swarm of aggressive hornets in your ear.

"See you around, Johnny."

Inside, it's crammed and loud. You strut into the auditorium-turned-arena on your Italian-imported heels, stirring the recycled, muggy air close to your face with your ostrich feather fan to keep the cigar smoke out of your eyes and nose.

What's happening in the ring isn't so much a fight as a massacre. Even from afar, you can see the bloody molar that is catapulted from Bonnie's mouth as Alfie's Cockney champion lands blow after blow. You scan the crowd. For being Goliath's uncle slash manager, the Jewish mobster is notably absent. Like a canary in a mine. Come to think about it, you haven't seen any of Alfie's men since you arrived.

A bicep hooks around your neck from behind. Thinking it's some handsy, drunken idiot, you twist, prepared to stab the handle of your fan in his eye—when Isaiah's smirk shows up in your periphery. The two of you dance like a couple of angry peacocks for a second.

"For fuck's sake, Siah. Do you have a death wish?"

He flicks your ear. "Bit testy, love?"

You swat his chest, shoulders relaxing. "Want to find out how testy exactly?" He's not wrong, you're on edge. Your attention slides back to the ongoing fight. "That Gold boy is fucking meat. Are we sure the fight's not fixed?"

"The boss doesn't seem too worried."

You catch Tommy's steel marble eyes. He holds your gaze for a second, then nods and turns his head disinterestedly. The man is not even surprised to see you. _You smell it too, don't you, Tom? Something's not right._

Next to him, Arthur is acting more the loose cannon than usual, probably doped up with enough cocaine to put a fully grown horse down. The cloud of booze that's hanging over him like a swollen storm cloud is strong enough to make your eyes water in sympathy.

"Where's Mickey?"

You keep your gaze fixed on the ring, inwardly wincing at every impact of bone on flesh while your heart bleeds thick black tar. "I've come alone."

"How? There's been a strike. No trains entering or leaving Birmingham until tomorrow."

"Hitched a ride on back of a milkman's wagon."

"Resourceful." Isaiah sticks a cigarette to the corner of his lips. "Are you going to kick me in the bollocks if I ask what happened that made you ditch my best mate and run back to Birmingham?"

"Yep." You pop the p, pulling your bottom lip between your teeth. "And I wasn't running."

"Whatever you say, love."

One of the judges rings the bell for another round.

"I'm going to powder my nose." In truth, the nod Tommy gave you a few minutes ago was your cue to take a look around this place, be his eyes and ears because he can't leave without raising a few brows.

"You need some powder?" Isaiah reaches into the pocket of his jacket, not at all talking about the cosmetic variety.

You shake your head and step around him. "I got it. Don't go anywhere. I'll be right back."

Your eyesight adjusts to the poorly lit hallway. You have every intention of passing the ladies' room to scope out the sound stage and mechanical rooms when the sound of a flushing toilet and familiar female voices ricochets through the ajar door.

"Ladies," you greet and close the door with kick of your heel. "What are you biddies getting up to in here? Signing the devil's book? No offense, Linda." You hop on the sink beside Lizzie and nick a smoke from her. A mist of expensive French perfume hangs over their carefully styled hairdos.

"Oh, look who's back," Linda says snidely, glaring at you in the mirror. The tip of her nose is smudged white. How the mighty have crumbled.

"Sorry to disappoint," you quip and adjust the sparkly rhinestone-studded bandeau with one hand. "So what's this secret meeting about?"

Ada glances round, grinning, then quickly faces the front again to pencil on a pomegranate-red lip. "Lizzie had an announcement to make. Go ahead, tell her."

Lizzie rolls her eyes and drapes herself against the sink. "I'm pregnant."

Oh. You choke on the smoke in your mouth. Tears shoot into your eyes as you cough and struggle for air like a dying pneumonia patient.

"Bloody hell. Pregnant?" You wheeze, folding one arm over your chest and staring at her flat stomach like she's hiding a hand grenade under her dress. "With a baby?"

"No, with a chain-smoking horse. Of course, a baby." Lizzie plucks the cigarette that hangs loosely from your fingers and pats your back until the coughs subside.

"If it's Tommy's, I wouldn't be surprised if it was a chain-smoking horse," you mumble.

What is an appropriate response to one of your closest friends telling you they're up the duff with your emotionally stunted boss's child? My condolences? Get well soon? Congratulations, you've won the lottery?

"So, Linda's meatloaf wasn't to blame, huh?" You say under your breath and pull her into a tight hug, pecking her powdered cheek. "I'm happy for you, Liz. How did Tommy take the news?"

"The way you'd expect," she clips dully.

"He wrote a check."

Her lips purse. "What do you think?"

"Bastard."

"I do wonder." Polly pushes off the wall and walks over to you, a clear bottle of Tommy's newest gin concoction in her hand. Her dark gaze dips below your chin. "Where did you get that?"

"Oh, this old thing?" You loop a finger around the necklace's silver chain, twirling it. "I stole it. Thought you'd approve."

_Crack_.

You hear rather than feel the slap. Your head snaps to the side. Your cheek prickles.

"Poll!"

"You dare to bring that here? Do you have no shame?" Polly spits the words out like they're made of nails and barbed wire.

You move your jaw, testing if it's dislocated. It's not.

"Why don't you ask your son? He knows how shameless I can be." You're not sure why you're provoking her. Maybe it's the hip flask tucked in your garter. The one you emptied in the cab on your way here.

Polly's left eye ticks twice. You know this isn't about the bloody necklace. Not completely. She's furious with you for leaving Michael.

"That's enough out of you." Lizzie steps between you before either of you draws a gun.

"Come on, Poll." Ada takes Polly by the shoulders. Linda follows them out the door.

"It belonged to Grace. The necklace. She wore it the night she died."

Turning back to the mirror, you let your head drop between your arms. _Shit. Shitting fuck._

"I didn't know."

Lizzie ambles toward you, putting her hand over yours on the sink. "I can see you're hurting, darling. You're like dog with a thorn in its paw. You lash out when you're hurt."

"My, thanks for the brutal assessment," you drawl.

"You're doing it right now. You sure you weren't born a Shelby?"

"Better not. That would make things a bit awkward." You poke at the humming, heated skin under your eye. "Michael and I fought."

"How bad was it?"

"He kept things from me."

"And you don't?"

You jerk your hand free. "Tommy told you."

"As your friend, let me say this, you're going to to regret not telling him."

You turn on the faucet and watch the water gushing down the drain, your lips tightly sealed.

"Anything else, Lizzie?"

Lizzie's warmth leaves your side. "Right, I'll see you outside. You should wait until Polly has calmed down."

"Do you think he'll forgive me?" You blurt before you can shove the words back into your throat. "If he finds out."

There's a beat of silence. "I don't know."

"Would you?"

"Maybe, with time. Tell him, Y/N."

Then you're alone.

Back bowed, you spritz some water into your face and scowl at yourself in the mirror. God, you're brooding like a real Shelby now. Lizzie's words clatter noisily in your head like steel cans being kicked down a street. Out of the corner of your eyes, you notice Ada left her lipstick on the side of the sink.

Your right cheek has turned red like you overdid it with the rouge.

Turning off the water and drying your hands on a paper towel, you don't react when the door opens again and someone—probably Ada returning for her lipstick, you think—walks in.

The footsteps stop.

"Back already? You forgot your—" There are two faces in the mirror. None of them belong to Ada. The bathroom lighting gives the man's skin the color of rancid lard. He's one of the Goliath's trainers. The one with the gold tooth. It glints when he grins at you.

A shout catches in your throat. Grabbing your hair by the root, he seizes your head and drives it forward into the mirror with crushing force. Once, twice. Three times. The sharp, jagged edges of the broken glass cut your lip. Blood shoots from your nose into your mouth. It tastes like fear. Coppery. Metallic like the stench of animal terror in a butcher's shop.

The necklace's thin chain pulls taut around your neck like a cutting wire, chokes off your airflow. Pure survival instinct takes over as he drags you away from the sink and crashes against a bathroom stall.

He forces you to your knees, using the necklace as a garotte. The pressure at your throat tightens until black and white spots appear on the edges of your vision. The dampness on the floor soaks through your sheer stockings.

You run through the numbers in your head. Seven minutes. A human can survive seven minutes without oxygen. Less when they're being strangled. Two or three minutes before they're likely to lose consciousness.

Your nails bend backward as you scratch at his pant legs, the tiles, his shoes, your own throat, that damned sapphire—already betraying its bearer. You try to claw it off, but that blasted chain is stronger than any rope used for the gallows.

The man curses in Italian. You don't understand the frustrated words but you get his meaning. _The bitch won't die._

A minute. You feel the life drain out of you like sand running through a hourglass. A woolly curtain descends over your mind. Your arms and legs slacken. Kicks slow to twitchy jerks.

Thirty seconds.

You can hear birds. The sound of water nearby. Sunshine slipping through the forest canopy. Michael's chest rising and falling beneath your cheek. Lazy jaw kisses. Your fingers tangling in sun-warmed hair, dancing over his freckled shoulder. It's safe there with him. Warm. Not like the cold bathroom floor under your hands and knees. A cozy place to rest your heavy head. Rest. You're tired. So fucking tired of it all. We should've stayed there.

"Y/N, have you seen my lipstick? I must have left it—oh, god." Ada's voice fills your ears. But that's wrong, you frown, slightly annoyed with the interruption. Ada doesn't belong in your dream place.

Two gunshots rings out, followed by a loud thud.

You come close to passing out as your lungs expand painfully. Breathing feels like swallowing pointy needles. The stone slips from your throat and falls heavily against your breastbone. You pant for air and, with the pressure gone from your neck, buckle forward, almost hitting your head on the tiles.

Ada's hands don't shake as she squeezes the trigger for a third time. She lowers the revolver and you blacken out for a second. When the fog lifts from your eyes, her palm is on your back. You wonder if this was her first kill.

"...call an ambulance?"

You shake your head, hands going to the necklace.

"Take it off," you croak, panicking. "Fucking take that off. Off." The burning pain that claws at your throat makes speaking excruciating.

Ada strokes your head. "It's fine, sweetheart. We'll take it off. See, it's off."

In that moment, Tommy and Polly burst through the door, drawn here by the sounds of shooting. Both are armed.

"Holy Jesus," Polly gasps, crossing herself as she looks from you to the assassin lying in a puddle of his own blood.

"Are you all right?" Tommy urges, all business, but there's a strain of anxiety around his eyes and mouth. There's are scarlet smears on his hands.

Ada sees it too. "Tommy, what happened? Whose blood is that?"

He doesn't blink. "They got to Arthur first. He's dead."

~~~

The next morning, on the day of Arthur's funeral, Tommy gives the order to bring Michael home.

It's noon now. The sun is out. Charlie and Curly lead the horse that pulls the red vardo, that has become Arthur's coffin, down Watery Lane.

With a heavy heart, you watch the procession through the window of Michael's car while you wait for him to come back from the family meeting Tommy called earlier today.

Mourners line both sides of the street, tucking wreaths of flowers, small loaves of bread and whiskey bottles into the racks and cases fitted on the wagon's outside frame.

The car door opens and you grip the steering wheel a little tighter. "How did it go?"

Michael settles into the passenger seat. He's quiet for a while, rubbing his stubbly jaw with a gloved hand. "He's sending me away. I don't think I'll be coming back."

There's nothing cool or collected about him now. Just a young man who's just been told by the person he viewed as a mentor that he doesn't have a home anymore.

Your heart thuds like a box being pushed down a staircase. "Did he say why?"

"He said he has a plan, some business I have to take care of in New York, but that's not...He's exiling me because I betrayed him. Because I chose Polly over him."

"He forced that choice on you."

"Does it matter?"

"It should," you say fiercely. Your knuckles, still curled around the wheel, pop. Your secret almost gushes out, right then, but you bite your tongue.

"When does the train leave?"

"In an hour. Everything's been handled. My bags are already at the train station."

"Right, then we only have to go back to the house to get mine."

Michael looks at you for the first time since he got into the car.

"I'm coming with you, of course," you say firmly. "We promised, remember? I go where you go." The only promise you ever intended to keep.

Michael's hands are gentle as he carefully tugs on the polka dot silk neckerchief you tied around your neck to cover up last night's damage.

"Not the prettiest sight," you warn but he's undeterred. The bruises look like a collar of amethysts and emeralds against your throat. His face hardens as he inspects the welts, turns to stone like one of the Italian marble sculptures you saw in the National Gallery once. Bouchardon's Sleeping Faun.

"I'm sorry I wasn't there," he says in a rough voice.

_I'm sorry I ran away. I'm sorry for so many things._

You let him pull you close. Your foreheads touch while you cling to each other. His island. The island to his dark, deep ocean.

"We're going to be all right," you speak over his lips.

_I made sure of it._

Because you're not an island. You've always been the fucking storm.


	21. Chapter 21

_Liverpool_

You nearly jump out of your skin the first time the concierge refers to you as Mr. and Mrs. Gray. The hotel staff seems to be under the impression that you and Michael are newlyweds, a minted business man and his fresh-faced wife embarking on their honeymoon to America. You're put up in the presidential suite, complete with wine-red brocade curtains, high gold ceiling, gold crown molding, and an Empire chandelier dripping with crystals.

You can see the RMS Monroe from the window. The ocean liner is idling in the port like a gargantuan steel-hulled water bird, scheduled to leave port in less than three hours.

Stretching your leg, you lift it out of the steaming bathwater and wriggle your toes to cool off. The temperature is somewhere between a boiler and hell.

"There's a house in Sutton Place. Red bricks all covered in ivy. A bright blue front door. Honey locusts in the front." Your pruned fingers fiddle with the cursed sapphire. "That old codger, Vanderbilt, built it for one of his daughters as an engagement present."

You remember all the times you drove past that painted blue door when Harvey took you out for a joy ride around the city with his filthy rich friends, Leo Vanderbilt often and richest among them. Both sons of the gilded Four Hundred, him and Harv went to Yale together. The Routledges boasted a rather incestuous web of familial connections with the Du Ponts and the great Astors themselves. Harvey's mother had been a niece of Caroline Schermerhorn Astor.

"I'm going to buy it." Smirking to yourself, you drop the stone in the water with a soft splash and fish it out again.

"A Vanderbilt mansion? That's humble, even for you." Michael rises from the hotel sheets, which are rumpled from a lazy morning fuck, and adjusts the slim silver chain links of his sleeve garters above his elbows. They felt snug around your wrists, which are still pleasurably sore. He rubbed them and brushed his lips over the sensitive pulse points after he'd untied you from the bed frame.

"It's New York, baby. The people there take offense at moderation." You blow a crater into the island of rose-scented foam floating atop the water. "Are you saying I should put it out of my head?"

"Anything you want." He starts buttoning up his waistcoat.

"Anything?" You purr. "I want a lot of things." Suds slip from your shoulders as you sit up and peer over the bathtub's slanted end, following his gaze to the French window. You know what he's looking at.

"That ship is our future, Michael. And this." You hold the sapphire against the sunlight falling into the room like a mist of gold. The light doesn't shine through the opaque blue stone. "This is our future."

That's why you took it, or at least that's what you tell yourself when the guilt gnaws at your heart with nibbling rat teeth.

The chuckle in his voice vibrates in your chest. "Then stop playing with it like a kitten with ball of yarn." You feel his lips scorch your nape, his nose tickling the divot at the top of your spine.

"You're no fun."

Reaching back, you tangle your hand in his hair and direct his mouth back to yours.

~~~

The docks are packed with exhausted passengers, waiting in line like corralled livestock queuing up for the chopping block. The noise, the biting smell of scorched tar and fish guts, makes the crammed space feels claustrophobic.

A harbor police officer blows his whistle. The shrill sound cuts through the air as loud as a ship's air horn. "Tickets for sailings other than today's will be destroyed. If you can't read the date on your ticket, find someone who can. First class boarding begins now. Keep your papers ready."

Michael tugs your hand. You didn't even realize the line moved. Every few seconds, your eyes dart up to the black station clock. An anxious, paranoid feeling has quietly, stealthily, trickled into the back of your mind like a leaking tap. It makes your palms itch.

"What's wrong?" Michael keeps his voice low as you push past an exhausted mother with a wailing infant.

"Do you know that man, in the gray hat?" You stare at a crust of dried seagull shite inches from the pointed tip of your high heel.

Michael's brows collapse together. "He works for Tommy."

"He's watching us. Has been for the half an hour. I wasn't sure at first...."

"Next! Your papers, sir?" The police officer takes one look at your tickets, the golden Cunard Line logo printed on them, and the names on your travel documents. "You both have to come with me."

"Is there a problem with the papers, officer?" Footfalls descend to your right. Pulse quickening, you take a step back and bump into another man in uniform who's come up behind you.

"Don't resist, miss." He grabs your arm.

"Don't fucking touch her!" Michael roars, pushing him off you.

"We have our orders, Mr. Gray."

"Whose fucking orders?" He glares at the officer in the dark, bell-shaped helmet.

"The Peaky Blinders."

You're taken to a room next to the registry room, which, by the looks of it, is used for medical inspections. The man who's waiting in there isn't a doctor, but in a bloody trade of an entirely different kind.

Tommy's standing in the middle of the room with his legs apart, hands linked in the front, flat cap pulled low over his eyes. Inspector Moss is with him. He tosses the other officer a half-crown and sends him on his way.

"What the fuck, Tommy?" Michael rushes forward, cold fury emanating from him like as an ice storm. "What's all this?"

Tommy lights up a cigarette. "Does the name Sergeant Woodes Burke ring any bells for you?"

"No?" Michael's jaw ticks. "Is there a point to all of this?"

"I'm not talking to you, Michael," Tommy says and turns his eyes on you.

You hold each other's gaze for a long beat until the pressure lodged in your throat becomes unbearable. "What's it to you, Tom? What do you want?"

"Honesty."

That startles a bitter laugh from your lips. "Tommy Shelby wants to talk about honesty. Oh, that is rich."

"You didn't answer the question. You don't know Woodes Burke?"

You once witnessed a dog fight in the streets. They were starved for days, driven half mad with hunger. The dogs circled each other; the bigger one snapping its jaws at the smaller one's soft throat, waiting for the right moment to chomp down and tear out its windpipe with its teeth. Tommy has the same look in his eyes right now.

"You don't have to listen to this," Michael announces and takes your hand. "We're leaving."

"You're free to go, Michael, but she stays. " Tommy rubs the corner of his mouth with the hand that's holding the cigarette. "Now, answer the question."

"Never heard of him."

"He was the inmate counselor at Winson Green Prison."

You shrug.

"Odd given that you were mandated to meet with him once a week for the entirety of your 18-month sentence."

"Pig shite always smells the same to me." You flash a saccharine smile at Moss. The man's hand twitches to his truncheon.

"Sergeant Burke was found dead in his office shortly after you were released. Someone seems to have slipped a number of tablets into his brandy. Someone with regular access to his office. The coroner has identified the drugs in his system as a sedative used to calm female prisoners." Tommy deliberates. You want to tear that smirk off his face. "But none of this is news to you, of course, since it was you who put the tablets in his drink. It took a lot to smoothe that over with the Lord Chamberlain."

You let out a controlled breath. Moisture has gathered on your palms. "Shite, he deserved it, Tommy. The things he oversaw...the things he turned a blind eye to....They almost broke Polly in there."

"Burke and I served together in the war," Moss grunts. "He was a good man. A good police officer."

"High praise indeed." You sneer. "So, what is it to be, Tom? Are you going to have me arrested again?"

"If you set one foot on that ship, it will be counted as a violation of your parole conditions, and you will most certainly be arrested. You will hang, this time," he promises darkly.

The pit in your stomach gapes into an abyss. "Fuck you. You knew this when we—you agreed."

"I did what you asked. America was your idea."

"What is he saying?" Michael's voice is carefully clipped but neutral. Impersonal. The tightly composed voice he uses to negotiate business. _Is that what I am to you now? An adversary on the other side of the table._

"Michael—"

"He doesn't know?" Tommy clamps his figurative teeth over your figurative throat and bites down on your pulse. "You see, Michael, she came to me after Changretta visited you in the hospital, asking—no—begging me to send you away."

"Is this true?" Michael's gaze is as sharp as the creases in his suit.

"This isn't what I wanted," you croak.

"Is it fucking true, Y/N?" He doesn't raise his voice, but it cuts all the same.

"Yes."

He drops your hand, looking at you like you're a stranger.

"Why?"

_Because it was your mother who begged me. A dead woman made me promise. Because I love you._

"Because it's going to kill us. This life. Look at what it did to him." You swing your gaze to Tommy, who's watching you with that bone-chilling calm that makes you question if he's even human, sometimes.

"Eleven o'clock, Michael." Tommy checks his golden pocket watch and tucks it back into the breast pocket of his waistcoat. "It's time. A car will be waiting for you when you arrive in New York."

"Michael." _Look at me_. He does and you know it's the last time. He doesn't say anything else as he turns away and walks to the door.

You want to run after him—fuck your pride—but you're paralyzed, hovering outside of your body like a ghost. If there was something, an invisible thread, that ties you together, it snaps when the door falls shut, and the sensation of loss cleaves you right down the middle.

You turn to anger because it's familiar, easier to confront.

"You did this!" Hat toppling from your head, you whirl around and slam Tommy into the nearest wall, hands fisted into the lapels of his coat. The cigarette drops from his mouth. You want to kill him right then and there.

"Do it," he taunts, and you know he's serious, that part of him wants you to try.

"God, it must be horrible being you." Disgusted, you shove off from him.

Tommy straightens the collar of his coat. "You're wrong, you know. You did this to yourself."

~~~

The RMS Monroe is a distant, dark speck on the horizon by the time you storm away from the docks. Tears scald your cheeks. The sea breeze saves you the trouble of wiping them away. He's gone. It's over. And he's never coming back.

You hail a hackney cab off the busy street, uncaring where it takes you, as long as it's far away from Birmingham.

~~~

_London_

_3 weeks later..._

White powder covers the main floor of the Eden Club like a thin layer of freshly fallen snow. Snuffling, you lift your nose from the rolled £50 note and thumb the excess cocaine off the tip. Numbness quickly follows the spreading burn in your nose and mouth, dripping down your throat. The taste is chemical. Like gasoline. You wash it down with vodka.

The bloke who paid for your drink and the three that came before—Anthony? Albert? You really don't give a fuck—has thrown his arm around your neck. "I have a house on Grosvenor Square." He slurs his posh Etonian accent, puffing out his chest. "We could move the party over there, what do you say to that, toots?" His hand creeps closer to your breast, chasing shivers of revulsion over your skin.

"Not even if you were the Prince of Wales himself." You tear away until you're separate. "Now beat it."

"You can't do that. I spent my money on you," he blusters. "My father owns a barony in Derbyshire. I'm second in line to inherit."

Already turning away, you grab your drink from the bar and down the remaining contents. "How exciting for you. Since you're such a prize, I'm sure there are plenty of women here tonight who are happy to fuck the spare."

"Bitch." He gropes for you. In a matter of second, his head is flat on the bar counter and you have his offending arm bend back at an unnatural angle.

"Try that again and I'll break your arm. Now, god bless and fuck off."

Your whole body stiffens as a tall man, all dressed in black, appears at your side. The hair at the back of your neck rises.

"You heard the signora. You might want to rejoin the other gentlemen at the poker table and collect your brother. He's just wagered your family's estate."

"That little shite." Tail between his legs, he takes off in direction of the gambling hall.

"These English boys don't know how treat a beautiful woman."

"And you're much more tactful, Mr. Changretta?" You ask as you stare at the bottom of your shot glass, contemplating the shortest escape route. His men shadow all the exits. Fear heightens, sharpens your senses, even more so than the cocaine.

Changretta places his black hat on the bar and nods to the barman, who pales and hurries to put a glass of whiskey in front of him. "Forgive me if I left a bad impression. My mother taught me better." He considers. "Let us start again, hm? A dance?"

His hand hovers a few inches short of your face. You count the gold rings crowning four out of five tattooed knuckles.

"I don't dance."

"But I insist"

A blunt pressure pokes at your chest—the cold barrel of a gun.

"I'll scream."

He smiles wolfishly. "Don't get me excited."

You look around. Everyone is too drunk and coked out of their mind to notice your distress. He could kill right in the middle of that dance floor and no one would care. The band is mid-set, playing a frenzied, exhilarating ragtime tune. Young people dance between tables, on the tables, completely uninhibited.

Changretta pulls you close—way closer than the music demands—and starts to sway you like you're slow dancing, the gun still pressed between your ribs.

"You're a long way from Birmingham, tonight. No Shelby has left that sewer of a city since December, hiding away like canal rats. You know what we do with rats in New York?"

"The same thing we do with them in Birmingham?"

"We block their holes. Lock them in the walls with no way out. Let them starve until the vicious things turn on each other. They eat their own, even their young."

You scoff. "Fascinating analogy. But I don't work for the Peaky Blinders anymore."

"You do look like a woman who likes to be on the winning side."

You flick your brows up. "The winning side? You mean your side, Mr. Changretta?"

"Call me Luca."

"Luca." You show your teeth. "You kept busy these past few weeks. I heard Alfie Solomons and the Cortesi brothers have already fled the city. I suppose Sabini and the Titanic will be next."

"Sabini was seen boarding a ship to Sicily two days ago for a very lengthy family visit," he drawls. "Leaving all of this free for the taking. And the rest of London will follow soon."

You don't let your alarm show. Sabini was the only thing standing between war and complete occupation; between Changretta and the Shelbys. Now, the board is empty except for two players. "My goodness, you Americans really are ahead of us."

"You act surprised. Why did you come here tonight?"

_To forget_. "Why does anyone come to a place like this? To drown my problems before they learn how to swim. For a dirty night I won't remember in the morning."

Luca's breath fans the shell of your ear. "Liar." He slides the gun up your body at an excruciatingly slow pace until the barrel rests in the soft, vulnerable hollow under your chin. You gulp, throat moving against the cold metal. One small move and your brains will decorate the club's mirrored ceiling.

"I think you were looking for me," Luca whispers like he's telling you a secret. "You knew Eden Club was mine before you came here. I think you wanted to risk it. You came for the Black Hand. An executioner willing to put a bullet through that pretty, fucked up head, free of charge. Do you think I don't know that Polly Gray's son fucked off to America, huh? Left you here all alone. Now, that's cold." He removes the gun's safety with a quiet, insignificant click. The sound cuts your breath short.

He brings his face close to yours. "Haven't you heard? The vendetta is over. Tommy Shelby lost. I'm going to take everything—his dignity, his company, his warehouses, his whole fucking city. And he's going to let me have it."

You gasp when the cold pressure of the gun is lifted.

"It was a pleasure dancing with you." Luca kisses your hand. His thin lips linger over your knuckles for a moment, then he turns, swaggers away and vanishes into the crowd.

The pavement outside the Eden Club is slick and shiny with rain as you fall to your hands and knees, hurling bile and vodka and whiskey sours on an empty stomach onto the curb. When it's done, you let your head drop forward. Heaving, you focus on slowing your breathing.

In and out.

In.

Out.

At least, you don't have an audience. Well, except for the bone-grubber picking through garbage a little further down the street. The old man is wrapped in rags, which are in turn lined with newspaper, a greasy sack slung over his shoulder. He's so covered in grime, you can't tell where his coat rags ends and his skin begins. He scurries back into the shadows when a matte-finish Rolls-Royce approaches. The car comes to a stop right next to you. The tinted rear window rolls down, releasing a plume of cigar smoke that was trapped inside, and a face appears—a golden David.

"Harvey?"

~~~

_Birmingham_

_4 months later..._

It's too hot for June. The asphalt is baking, the nearly trimmed hedge roses have wilted, and even the most proper housewife has chosen her lightest frock to wear today.

A couple of young boys in knickerbockers chase hoops down the street, running toward a man selling ice cream on a tricycle.

You keep your head down as you pass the shingle-fronted houses, tightly clutching the heavy pea coat that hangs from your shoulders despite the heatwave. It's several sizes too big for you and goes down to your swollen ankles. Somebody left it in the waiting room at King's Cross Station.

You open the white picket gate and walk up the stepping stone path to the front door. Polly got her drainpipe fixed.

You rap the door once, then wait. After two minutes, you knock again. You know she's in. Her Vauxhall is parked outside.

As soon as your knuckles touch the door for a third time, it swings open. Polly's hair has grown. It's now curling softly around her ears.

"Yes? Oh, it's you," she clips, her dark eyes narrowing. "You've got some nerve to show your face here. What do you want?"

"Help." Your hands shake as they unbutton the coat.

Her gaze drops to your noticeably rounded stomach, staring. It's become an instinct to clutch it, especially when you feel it move.

"Help me."

Polly steps away from the door, opens it wide.

"Come in."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's going to be a 3 year jump between the end of this chapter and the next (so pretty much like in the show)! See you again in 2021/1929 😉


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